Skulls and Sociopaths and Jumpers
by Miyazaki A2
Summary: Collected short stories mostly having to do with John and Sherlock, although other characters do come into play. The chapters may be a little out of order sometimes, but they are all connected for the most part. Warnings for slash, angst, and fluff.
1. Phobias

**Title**: Something Like Hydrophobia and Acrophobia at the Same Time  
**Pairing/Characters**: Sherlock/John in either a reeeeeally close friendship, or pre-slash. Take your pick.  
**Rating**: PG-13, let's say.  
**Word count:** A little under 3700.  
**Summary**: In which Sherlock and John have a case near Niagara Falls, and John has a deeply seated fear of waterfalls. Hilarity does not quite ensue.  
**Warnings:** Set after "The Great Game," so there are bound to be spoilers. Also, there's a scene describing a dead body with really bad wounds, so watch out. Lastly, this is un-Beta'd and un-Brit-Picked. So you must be forgiving if it's horrible.  
**Disclaimer**: If I owned Sherlock and John, I'd be happy with just that and wouldn't feel the need to invent phobias for them and then immediately send them to countries in which their phobias become manifest. So obviously I don't, and I'm making no monies.

* * *

John, Sherlock knew, was not a man of many fears. Granted, his mild post-traumatic-stress-disorder had lent him the odd nightmare—first solely about Afghanistan and later about Afghanistan _and _darkened pools. And then of course there were those pesky trust issues. They didn't seem to apply to Sherlock, whom John trusted and even, well, _cared for _in a remarkably small amount of time—but the point was they were real. Sherlock could see them in the way John often avoided other people's gazes when speaking about himself, as if he hoped that people would assume he was lying if he wouldn't look them in the eye. He didn't like letting anyone in—all the way in, at least.

But, again, he didn't seem to have any trouble letting Sherlock in. Likely it was that John believed that Sherlock could figure out anything he wasn't told, so to save time, John oftentimes opted for just _telling_.

Which is how Sherlock found out about John's deeply seated fear of waterfalls. Given the situation, Sherlock probably could have deduced this fact from John's actions and reactions, but John saved him the trouble—or perhaps the fun.

It'd started with an e-mail from Mycroft—addressed to Sherlock but sent to John's inbox.

"Bloody—! _Sherlock! _Why does the Holmes family take such offense to the idea of respecting my property as _mine_?"

In lieu of answering, Sherlock padded over from the sofa to where John sat seething in his usual chair and took the laptop.

"Oh, I get it—because you and your brother _need _it more. For security. _Right. _Never mind if someone ever comes to realize that your name and mine are _somehow _connected."

Sherlock smiled at the exasperated, half-hearted bitterness in John's voice, but still did not deign to speak. His sharp eyes flitted over the message for a few seconds longer, and then he handed the computer back to John. "Read it aloud, John, if you would."

At least John knew to no longer question _that _command—it was something about the fact that hearing the words helped solidify them in Sherlock's mind, or something. Helped him process information and mull over possibilities at the same time. Or maybe he just enjoyed telling John what to do. That was probably it.

"Er, right," said John as Sherlock laid back down on the sofa, closing his eyes and pressing his long fingers together at the tips. "It reads: _'Sherlock. An English agent has gone missing in Ontario, Canada, in close vicinity to Niagara—'"_ Without so much as an apology, he stopped reading, making a small choking sound in the back of his throat.

Sherlock, his nose scrunching up but his eyes remaining closed, looked more than a little annoyed at the interruption of data. "Yes, yes, Niagara Falls. _Please _go on."

John cleared his throat in apparent discomfort. "Right. Um. _'The agent was meant to deliver to the Canadian government a series of important documents pertaining to a two Canadian criminals detained here in the UK. It is of the utmost importance that this man and his documents be found. The criminals could go free unless they reach the right hands. More information is attached, as well as plane tickets and hotel reservations for yourself and Dr. Watson. Mycroft.'" _John's stomach did a sloppy, unpracticed somersault. "Hell. He wants us to go to Niagara Falls?"

Sherlock cocked an eyebrow. "I'm surprised you're not more pleased. Aren't the Falls supposed to be one of those scenic, romantic little spots that people like _you _seem to love so much?"

John skidded over the veiled condescension with practice. "Well, some people, yes, but so is the Eiffel Tower! Why can't anybody ever send us to Paris? Is that so much to ask of criminals?"

Sherlock sensed something of a deflection in John's words, which wasn't an altogether uncommon feature in their conversations…but it _was _an altogether annoying one.

"Do you object to taking this case?" he asked evenly. "Do you have some repressed terror of Canadians that you've neglected to make me aware of?" He smiled wryly for a moment, but stopped once he saw the grave look on his friend's face. "John?"

"It's not _Canadians_, stupid," John protested meekly. "It's…well, don't make fun of me, but it's…waterfalls."

There was a beat of silence, of simply looking into each other's eyes without moving a muscle. And then:

"Waterfalls?"

"Yes. I don't like them, never have. Even seeing them on the telly makes me uncomfortable." He sighed. "It's irrational."

And then John's gaze fell to his feet, while Sherlock remained staring, jarringly silent. He was cataloguing information, fitting this phobia into the folder of knowledge he had already amassed about his flat-mate, making sure it corresponded with all the other files. He saw how the subject alone had already caused the lines around John's mouth and eyes to deepen. Saw how his shoulders had gone rigid, and how his left hand shivered just the slightest bit, almost imperceptibly. For a brief, blazing moment Sherlock wanted to still that trembling hand with both of his own, but he rallied at the last moment and fought the urge back.

Instead, he said, "So you _do _object to taking this case." It wasn't a question; it was a deduction.

And for a fraction of a moment, Sherlock could see that he was right—the hand stilled of its own volition, damn—but it was obvious that John, too, was attempting to shove his emotions aside. Except, rather than unwonted tenderness, John was battling relief.

By the end of Sherlock's next breath, John had won his battle. His head snapped up. "No, I don't object. Of course I don't object. I wouldn't let you leave the country without me if there was any way I could help you."

"You won't be any help to me at all if you're battling your own personal issues the entire time we're there."

It is important to note, here, that Sherlock spoke a very specific sort of English. Although his words _sounded _a trifle hurtful, what he said was actually his equivalent of saying, _'I don't want to make you do anything that might damage you psychologically. You're too important.' _

John, thankfully, understood Sherlock-English, although he couldn't speak it himself. So he made due with: "Sod that. We might not even have to go _near _the Falls. I'm going." Which, in John's version of English, which Sherlock could likewise understand but not speak—or rather it was that he did not often _wish _to speak it—meant: _'I'm not letting you go alone. Bad things happen when we abandon each other. I'm going, phobia or no phobia.'_

And that was that.

* * *

In the end, there really _was_ no functional reason that John should have come to Ontario with Sherlock. Their hotel room had a spectacular view of a section of the Falls, which undid John's composure almost instantly. He fought not to show it, but of course there was no hiding anything from Sherlock, especially when the detective was waiting for it; at the first sign of quickened breath, Sherlock hastened to pull the heavy curtains closed with such force that John worried numbly that they would come off their rings.

Despite this small yet telling incident, John wouldn't allow himself to be abandoned in the hotel room with the same tenacity that he wouldn't allow himself to be abandoned in London. While Sherlock admired John's doggedness in nearly any other situation, he regretted not being more stubborn in insisting that there was no need for John to accompany him on his investigations, which would lead them past the Falls several times.

But John could be terribly bloody-minded when he wanted to be, so even if it meant that his hand would shake or that he would accidentally slip into military rest if he didn't pay attention, he was going to be _helpful_, damn it. He made extra efforts to pipe up when Sherlock was questioning locals, to try to contribute as much to the case as possible. He even paid for the tea when they stopped at a small café for lunch without even making Sherlock waste the energy to tell him to.

As far as Sherlock was concerned, the case was insultingly simple—the agent had obviously made the wrong sort of enemies by coming to deliver the incriminating documents to the government. After only two days of searching the vicinity morgue by morgue, they eventually found the agent, stone dead—although stone was perhaps the wrong thing to compare him to. Maybe shredded cheese was better.

He'd been found at the base of the Falls in one of those metal barrels that daredevils sometimes used to dive over the brink—quite an illegal and conspicuous activity. The authorities of course saw the barrel go over and had immediately gone to fish the barrel out of the water to arrest the daredevil—but obviously there had been something wrong with the make of the barrel, because it had collapsed in on itself, crushing the man inside.

John could handle the morgue, could function rather well in the environment despite the Cause of Death. "This man can't have been dead for more than twenty-four hours," he observed quietly, eliciting a sharp click from Sherlock's throat.

"Well, no," said the medical examiner. "He was only brought in yesterday."

Sherlock swore. "_John!_ He was alive when we got here! And the _entire time_ I've been looking for a body!" he hissed. "Why would his captors keep him alive for a week before sending him over the Falls?"

"Captors?" echoed the examiner, whom the two Englishmen easily ignored.

"Maybe he didn't have the papers on him when they kidnapped him," John suggested. "And they—"

"And they were trying to get information as to the papers' location, yes, of course!" Thus encouraged, Sherlock completely did away with the sheet covering the corpse's mangled and crushed body. Had there been anyone in the room whose occupation did not normally include horribly abused bodies, alive or dead, somebody surely would have gasped in horror. As it was, the coroner, doctor, and detective were very calm at the sight of the agent's broken, torn, and twisted body. Without the sheet, it was possible to observe all of the man's extensive injuries—knocked-in head, broken neck, rawness on wrists and ankles, no doubt where his captors had bound him, numerous deep cuts where the collapsed metal had sliced into his skin, large bruises from where he'd been beaten or else knocked around inside the barrel—all in one grim sweep of the eyes.

"And this was in a _barrel_," John murmured hollowly, sounding as deeply hurt as if it were Harry that he was staring down at on the morgue's pull-out tray.

This time, Sherlock's hand _did _move down to still John's, although it only made it to John's wrist, no lower. Nevertheless, John did seem to calm to the point of only mild discomfort, and only got better as Sherlock whispered, "A very badly made, almost certainly tampered-with barrel, produced by people who _wanted _this to look like a horrible accident."

The morgue-worker laughed uncomfortably. "So I take it this _wasn't _just a horrible accident?"

"Brilliant deduction," Sherlock quipped, meeting the third man's brown eyes. John knew that Sherlock couldn't have _forgotten _that the man was there, but he'd probably been blocking out the information. "This man was most definitely kidnapped by men hoping to force the release of their detained comrades in England. Nasty buggers," he murmured with nothing less than glee, his mind buzzing. "So the question is: where are the papers now? Likely they've been destroyed. So where are the killers? They have no real reason to leave the area, unless they fear that they've been seen—or else perhaps they wish to go to England to retrieve their comrades…"

Letting go of his friend's wrist, Sherlock proceeded to reach into John's coat-pocket and pull out John's mobile. He typed a quick text, likely to Mycroft, before returning the phone to John's pocket. The coroner watched this chain of events with mildly interested eyes and a quirked eyebrow. He gave another nervous laugh when he realized that John was watching his face.

'_Number of continents in which there live people who believe that Sherlock and I are shagging,' _thought John, _'now up to two.'_

"Come, John. There's nothing more to learn here." He took John's hand with deliberation this time, pulling him out of the room without so much as a nod of thanks to the helpful coroner.

* * *

It was harder for John once they were out in the open again, what with the Falls in such conspicuously close proximity. In fact, if anything, seeing the English agent's shattered body made his symptoms even _worse_. Walking became a real ordeal as his limp decided to return in full. Eventually he had to stop walking altogether, nearly pulling Sherlock, who still held his hand, off his feet.

"What are you going to do now?" he asked, not quite looking his flat-mate in the eye.

"I'm going to begin re-questioning the people who knew our unfortunate government agent. Perhaps the news of his death will make them more willing to be open with me." He paused, staring at John as if there was a complicated ciphered message on his forehead. "And then I was going to travel to up to the brink of the Falls to see if I could track this barrel to its source."

John flinched, and then pulled his hand away, shoving it into his pocket to fist around his mobile. "You see, that's what I was worried about. I'm sorry, Sherlock, but I can't go up there. I'm—I'm feeling pretty ill right now out here. Can I go back to the hotel room?"

A couple of emotions briefly fought for dominance over Sherlock's features—annoyance, of course, and…relief? What was _that _about? As it was, he settled predictably for annoyance. "Well of course you _can_, John, don't be stupid."

"Do you _mind _if I do?" _'Are you disappointed in me?'_

"Not in the least. I told you I already thought that you'd be spectacularly useless on this case." _'You lasted quite a long time, actually. I can take care of things from here. Take a nap.'_

"Oh, sod off." _'Thanks for understanding.'_

Sherlock laughed—the chuckle this time, not the bark or the cackle—and one quick, anxious hand shot out to push a strand of hair away from John's face; he'd let it grow too long. Then Sherlock did that odd winking-and-tongue-clicking _thing_ before turning on his heel and leaving John alone.

* * *

It wasn't until he'd been back in the hotel room for fifteen minutes that John realized that he liked the idea of _Sherlock _plummeting down the face of a waterfall exactly as much as he liked the idea of the same fate befalling himself. The sudden, unexpected panic was so terribly _gripping _that he could no longer focus on his idea of making tea. Instead he took out his mobile and typed what was most likely the most insipid, pathetic little message to ever leave his outbox.

A _ding! _sounded off from the direction of the bed-area. Bemused, John went to investigate. And lo, there it was—Sherlock's mobile on the bed he had claimed as his own. Right. John thought he remembered something about Sherlock complaining that he was tired of his brother's constant prying calls, but John had obviously been so busy mentally preparing himself for the day's excursions that he'd missed his flat-mate's decision to leave it in the room.

For a moment John considered deleting the incriminating message, but eventually decided against it for pure lack of motivation. Part of him wanted to see how Sherlock would react to it. So instead he decided to strip down to his undershirt and shorts, and then he proceeded to attempt to sleep off the effects of his not-altogether-irrational fear.

* * *

He didn't quite manage to sleep dreamlessly, though. There wasn't a whole terrible lot going on visually, but there was an outright _cacophony _of noise to abuse his mental eardrums. There was the sound of machine guns and _'He's gone, Dr. Watson! Let him go!' _and _'Hiii!' _and more machine guns and explosions and _'You've rather shown your hand there, Dr. Watson,' _and always, _always, _the sound of pounding, cascading, relentless water.

And then: "John? John, wake up. It's over."

John cracked his eyes open. Sherlock was there—of course he was there—kneeling at the side of his bed, his chin resting just so on the edge of the mattress. His long white hand was resting on John's bare upper arm.

"What's over?" John asked, speech slurring a bit due to stubborn grogginess. "The case? You've solved it?"

Sherlock scoffed. "'Solved' is hardly the correct word. Such a petty little problem, really—"

This made John bristle a little. "_Sherlock. _A man _died_. That isn't petty."

Sherlock had the decency to look indulgently contrite. Sociopath or not, he was _trying _to learn some manners from John, if only to please his friend. "Poor wording, forgive me. A _simple _problem. The killers were daft enough to allow themselves to be seen by an officer as they left the brink after dumping our agent in the current. He was able to give a rather comprehensive description of the criminals. They had fled a few cities over. The local force there caught them almost an hour after we put them on the alert. I swear I was only here to play a game of connect-the-dots. Mycroft will regret sending us here. The ends didn't justify the means."

As he said this last bit, his hand ghosted lightly up John's arm, stopping near the base of his neck. And then the hand disappeared, tangling itself with the rest of Sherlock's ridiculously long limbs. _'Are you alright?'_

"So we're done here, then?" _'I'll be perfectly fine as soon as we're home.'_

"Quite." He stood then, and then moved to his bed to take inventory on missed calls and texts from the day. John rolled onto his back and screwed his eyes shut once he remembered his stupid, sniveling little text—

"'Please don't fall in'?" read Sherlock, sounding absolutely perplexed and even _hurt _that the idea had ever even crossed John's mind. "_Really?_"

"I was in the middle of a panic attack; I can't be held responsible for my texts," John groaned as he pressed a hand to his eyes.

The mattress sunk a little when Sherlock sat down beside John, crossing his legs primly and removing John's hand from his face. He set it down _almost _gently along the curve of John's side. "John Watson. Do you really think that I'd be stupid or absent-minded enough—in _any _situation—to stumble into a waterfall?"

John laughed, although the sound was mildly insincere. "This isn't a psychosomatic limp, Sherlock. I'm not sure you can reason this phobia out of me. That's the _point _of phobias, I imagine. They're unreasonable."

Sherlock did not laugh. He looked paler than usual; his omnipresent scarf was oddly missing, so John could easily watch as Sherlock's Adam's-apple bobbed up and down as he attempted to literally swallow down some difficult emotion. His hand once more alighted on John's arm—the wrist again. "John, I'm not talking only about the waterfalls. I'm talking about life-and-death situations in general, let's say. I…I cannot promise that I'll never put our lives in danger again—"

"Not with _him_ still alive," John murmured, staring at Sherlock's hand on his skin.

Sherlock's lips twitched. "Precisely. But my point is…I'm not going to be so foolhardy anymore. I can't be. Not with—not with _you _involved." He almost sounded angry then, frustrated with everything having to do with anything. It passed though, it always passed, and his voice returned to its normal, slightly impassive inflection. "I want to be…more careful, I suppose."

John stared up at his flat-mate—no, his _friend_. Was this really Sherlock Holmes?

Well, of course it was, because he decided just then to read John's mind. "But don't think I'm doing this solely for _your _peace of mind, oh no. I'm much too selfish for that. No, I want the two of us to be relatively safe for my _own _reasons."

That whole speech was probably total rubbish, but John didn't mind. "But there'll still be a little bit of danger, right?"

Sherlock beamed—a shocking, unexpected gift. "Well, of course, more than a little. I simply _can't _abide by boredom.

'_God, I love you_,' thought John, dazedly. _'You and your stupid, brilliant mind and your terror of boredom.' _

But John didn't say that. Instead he said, "Well then, all things considered, I'm glad you _didn't _fall into the Falls, if it meant that I could get _that _rock-solid promise from you." Which basically meant exactly what he was thinking.

Sherlock gave another smile, a gentler one than before, one John never saw him give anyone else. It's was Sherlock's Just-For-John smile. "You nodded, you know. At the pool, there near the end when I had my gun out and was ready to blow us all to grimy little bits of flesh," he murmured, as if this little fact was the encryption key to decoding the cipher of John's very _being_. For all John knew, it was.

"Yeah," said John. "I guess I did."

"Well, I'm very glad you did, and that we both lived to _not _regret it." Which basically translated loosely into: _'God, I love you. You and your stupid, romantic little mind and your terror of waterfalls.'_

"Me too," said John, eliciting a small, fond scoff from Sherlock as he rose off the bed.

"Try to go back to sleep, John. It's two in the morning. We've got a plane to catch at six."

"At _six? _You…you…you _sociopath._"

And Sherlock just laughed.


	2. Breaking

**Title:** Better That We Break  
**Pairing/Characters:** Brief Sarah/John. Also, John/Sherlock friendship, or perhaps pre-slash.  
**Rating:** PG  
**Word count:** A little over 3100.  
**Summary:** In which Sarah decides it's time to change her Relationship Status. Sherlock is happy with her decision, and John is resigned to it.  
**Warnings:** Hmm...not many. Un-Beta'd and Un-Britpicked, but that's it. This one's very clean, if also a bit fluffy towards the end.  
**Disclaimer:** I own nothing but the positioning of the words. :)  
**Notes: **I felt bad about making my last story so fluffy without even addressing Sarah, whom John may very well marry in Canon, if rumors are to be believed. So this is me, getting rid of the Female Love Interest in order to allow for more slashy-fluff. You can say that this particular story is set after The Great Game and before "Hydrophobia and Acrophobia".

* * *

After that terrible first date, Sarah made it perfectly clear that she would _not _be dragged into another case ever again. She liked hearing about the cases, but only after the fact, after the danger had already come and gone; she was smart enough to want to avoid the trouble that John could not resist. John agreed. Of course John agreed. It was…it was _normal _that Sarah did not want to deal with defying death on anything near a regular basis. He wouldn't ever dream of asking her or accidentally causing her to risk her life like that again.

They went on several more dates after that, so often that one could almost say that they were dat_ing_. It was nice. It'd been far too long since John had dated a nice, normal girl. Things in his life had just been so crazy for so long. There'd been no time for romance of any sort. Even now there seemed be to _very little _time; frequently he had to cancel their dates on Sherlock's account, and more often than not the dates they _did _have ended with a text from Sherlock asking for John's assistance or even just his presence. John knew by Sarah's tight smiles that this habit was a bit not good, but there honestly wasn't anything he could do about it. Besides, despite everything, she always said yes to the next date.

It wasn't until after the pool incident—after Sarah had heard that John and Sherlock both had nearly been blown up by a psychotic criminal mastermind—that she started to say no.

She always made excuses for herself, as if she was embarrassed about refusing—she had a family thing, or a friend's birthday, or else she needed to take her cat to the vet. It took several tries before she finally just looked him in the eyes and answered, "Can we talk about this tomorrow? We've both got the day off. Let's do lunch. And talk."

John didn't need to consult Sherlock to know what _that _meant, although that didn't stop Sherlock and never would. As the detective poured himself a cup of coffee the next morning, he told John in the most nonchalant voice he could muster, "You think Sarah is going to break it off with you."

John had been pulling on his jacket, but paused to glare briefly at his flat-mate. "Yes, actually, I do. I'm pretty damn sure of it, actually. She said we needed to _talk_."

Sherlock gave John a look, unreadable for its fleetingness. The detective turned swiftly back to his coffee. "Dull."

John couldn't help getting a little angry at that. It wasn't as though he hadn't expected Sherlock to say something to that effect, but that didn't mean that he appreciated the man's dismissive attitude. "Speaking as a man who's about to be broken up with, I'd like to say that I don't find this situation _dull _at all." He licked his lips to stall, trying to quell his temper. "Upsetting, perhaps, would be a better word. _Disappointing,_ at the very damn least!"

Sherlock was unruffled. "Disappointing to _you_, perhaps," he quipped. "To me, this simply means that you'll have one less thing to distract you from helping me with my work."

John had to laugh at that, although the sound was bitter and unhappy. He approached his flat-mate and poured himself a cup just so he would have something to do with his hands other than throttling Sherlock. "We've been over this, Sherlock. The solar system revolves around the _sun_, not _you_."

John had just enough time to see the corners of Sherlock's full lips curl into a smile before the detective turned away to go sit at the beaker-covered table. "But wouldn't it be so much more convenient if it _did?_" he replied evenly. "Besides, don't try to tell me that you don't love our work."

'_I won't tell you that,' _thought John, despairingly. _'I promise I won't ever tell you that.'_

"What if I told you that I loved _Sarah_, too?"

Sherlock scoffed suddenly and unabashedly into his mug. "Oh please! John, don't give me that. I know you're quick to loyalty, but we _both _know you're not that quick to love." He paused and suddenly all signs of amusement left his features. "Besides, you told me yourself that your primary intent was to get off with her."

John sighed and ran a hand over his face. "Okay, yes, I did say something like that. But did it ever occur to you that, perhaps, once the said getting off bit had been accomplished, that maybe—just maybe—I considered Sarah to be somebody that I might _like _to fall in love with? Maybe even settle down with and _marry _sometime in the distant future?"

Sherlock set his mug down on the table so hard that the rest of the glassware clattered and trembled in protest. "It _did _occur to me. And that is _precisely _why I'm not disappointed that she's breaking it off with you!"

If Mrs. Hudson had been listening to this row from the lower level of the flat—which of course she wasn't, don't be so silly!—the next sound she would have heard above her head would have been that of feet stomping their way through her kitchen and sitting room and then down her stairs, and then the sound of her door slamming. After that, it was poor Sherlock's shout of "_Damn _it!"

* * *

As expected, John was right about what Sarah wanted to _talk _about. Her reasons as to why she could no longer go out with him were all perfectly sound and justifiable, even if her entire half of the conversation sounded rather utterly rehearsed.

Even when she was a teenager, she said, she'd always known that she didn't want to date or marry anyone who would constantly be putting his life in danger—firemen, policemen, active soldiers, or even part-time assistants to consulting detectives. It wasn't worth it. She never wanted to have to answer the door to find out that her lover had been killed in action, knew she couldn't deal with it. She also knew that John himself wouldn't want to be with a girl who felt that way; he _needed _the life she didn't want, and he _didn't _need to ever feel guilty about it.

She paused once she got to that point in her little speech of an explanation. She looked a little meek at whatever it was that she'd been about to say, as if she'd just now realized that perhaps it wasn't the most appropriate thing to put out there.

Her expression fascinated John. "Well, go on. I promise I can take it." And what he meant by that was, _'I really wouldn't dream of blaming you for any of this, so please could you kindly take that sad look off your face?' _but Sarah didn't seem to understand—or notice—the subtext. She averted her gaze to look out the window, worrying her bottom lip with her teeth.

"John, it's just…well, I just feel that, if things ever got serious between us…I think things could only ever end badly. I don't want there to be—"

John cut her off with a lift of his hand. "Wait, wait, wait. Things could _only _end badly? How do you figure?"

Sarah laughed, because obviously _he _hadn't understood whatever underlying message _she'd _been trying to convey, either. "Are you really going to make me say it, John?"

The lines around John's mouth deepened. "I really don't understand, Sarah."

"I can tell." Another nervous, humorless laugh. "God, John, don't think I'm a bitch or anything for saying this, but I just don't feel like I could ever be your first priority." She looked him in the eye for a few seconds, trying to convey how little she liked being in this position. John just looked at her, his brow furrowing as her words hit their mark.

"So this is about me and Sherlock, then," he said quietly, evenly.

"Just a bit, yes," she answered, laughing shakily. "I'm not angry about anything you've done on his account—I promise I'm not—but I just feel like…like I've inserted myself where I don't belong…like _you'd _be happier if you didn't always have to excuse yourself." She let out a flutter of breath through her pursed lips. "I _know _you enjoy working with him…and well, _being _with him. You _love _his world, John. International smugglers, deranged homicidal maniacs—you love it all! And how could I ever expect you to choose dull, normal old me over all _that_? Over living the life that will make you the happiest?" _'With the person that will make you the happiest,' _she didn't say.

John put his hands in his lap, licking his lips to stall again. "I was willing to try. Dull is nice. So is normal. Sherlock doesn't give dull or normal enough credit." He was just wasting time now, trying to see if a last-ditch effort to trick them both would work. It _wouldn't_, of course, but he had to try.

Sarah smiled thinly. "Sometimes, maybe, but not all the time, not for you." Her smile widened, then, became a little less sad and a little more genuine. "And besides all that stupid nonsense, it's simply unprofessional to date coworkers, especially ones that I hired myself."

John had to laugh at the deflection, and was glad not to _really _have to address her overall point. Small mercies. "Yes, well, I suppose that's true, isn't it? And I've really been trying to amass a _somewhat _respectable reputation down at the surgery. You're completely right about everything, Sarah." And he did mean _everything_, but he still wasn't sure if she was catching his nuances, or if she thought he was still joshing. For a brief moment he wished that Sherlock were there to act as translator, but he squashed the thought quickly. He couldn't think about Sherlock right now, or else he'd start to blame him. Despite their little row in the kitchen, John didn't want to be short-sighted about this situation, as was sometimes his habit.

He reached out to briefly touch Sarah's hand. "Thank you, Sarah. For, well, letting me down easy, I guess." His lips twitched into a crooked, ironic smile.

At least Sarah understood what _that _meant. She laughed uncomfortably and looked anywhere but at John. "Heh, I was worried that I was rambling a bit too much, or making you sound like the worst man in the world. That's not how I feel, you know. It's just not—"

"It's just not going to work. No, I understand. Don't worry about it. Besides"—and here his voice lowered—"I _know _I'm not the worst man in the world."

Sarah's eyes flickered around the restaurant, as if the _real _worst man in the world were possibly listening. For all they knew, he could have been. John had told Sarah all about his and Sherlock's encounter with Jim Moriarty and how all three men had narrowly managed to escape with their lives. Sarah knew enough about Moriarty to be unnerved at even the most casual allusion to him. When John thought about the consultant criminal, he was even more thoroughly convinced that it was probably best that Sarah remove herself from any connection with him. John had already shown his hand where Sherlock was concerned; he didn't need a huge list of people that could be used against him if Moriarty got them in his sights.

"They still haven't found him, then?" Sarah murmured, looking absolutely enthralled with the salad on her plate.

"We've seen neither hide nor hair of him since the pool, but we know for a fact that he isn't dead, at least. Sherlock thinks he's hiding out somewhere outside of London, biding his time until the Yard has to put his file aside and forget about him."

"But Sherlock won't forget." The implications behind this simple statement were obvious enough: if Sherlock couldn't forget, then neither could John. That's just how it worked.

"Yes, that's true. He's taking other cases, of course, but he won't really rest until we've caught the bastard." _'And Moriarty won't rest until he's completely destroyed Sherlock. Burned his heart out. God, I don't want that to happen. Sherlock's heart is—' _"You're right, though, Sarah. I need to be able to…_help_ Sherlock as much as possible. Thank you for…understanding that." _'I don't know if I would have understood on my own,'_ he didn't say.

Sarah nodded. "Right. Well. Hmm, then that's that, then."

"I guess so. Hmm."

A few somewhat awkward minutes later, John paid for both their meals before making a transparent excuse for getting the hell out of there.

* * *

When John came home, the kitchen had been cleaned and completely restocked with food, and the crisper was missing the assortment of severed ears that had been taking residence there that morning. John stood in the doorway of the refrigerator, staring vacantly in dumb surprise, for at least two minutes. He didn't come to his senses until an unexpected hand reached out from behind him and shut the refrigerator door. John started and turned to see Sherlock looming behind him, asking questions with his pale eyes. John was sure he found his answers in milliseconds.

Ignoring that, John said, "How the hell do you move so quietly?" at the same time that Sherlock muttered, "You were letting out the cold. You know Mrs. Hudson hates that." Then they both stared at each other for a few long moments, each refusing to show it if they were in any way abashed at the awkwardness between them.

Finally, just to have something to do with his hands and mouth, John jerked a thumb at the refrigerator behind him: "Mrs. Hudson threw out your ears."

Sherlock gave that quick, quirky smile of his and seemed to come out of whatever stupor he'd been in. "An understandable conclusion, but an erroneous one. _I _took them back to Molly. Id' finished with them." He eyed John for a moment, and then crossed his arms over his chest. "John, you're at military rest. Relax."

John started again and shook out his limbs for a second. "Damn it. Sorry. Um." His eyes flickered around the room. "Did you do the shopping too, then?"

Sherlock's nose wrinkled instinctively, but his intent eyes never left John's. "Yes, I did."

"W…_Why?_ That's my job."

Sherlock finally tore his gaze away, turning to walk somewhat briskly into the sitting room, as if he didn't want John anywhere near him when he answered. John followed anyway. "You were busy." And John could tell—somehow he just _could_—that Sherlock was simultaneously attempting to apologize for their row _and_ console John for the loss of his semi-girlfriend. The realization stopped John in his tracks. This caused Sherlock to stop as well, and to turn and stare at his friend again.

"That was kind of you," John told him, although what he meant for Sherlock to hear was, _'You silly git, you're not a sociopath.'_

Unlike Sarah, Sherlock understood. He always understood. He nodded noncommittally, but it was obvious to John that Sherlock was pleased to know that _John _was pleased. The detective usually didn't care to please _anyone_, except perhaps himself. John had the decency to feel somewhat honored.

Without warning, Sherlock disappeared for a minute into his bedroom, only to return with his violin in tow. At John's apprehensive expression, Sherlock smirked and cocked his head to one side. "Don't worry. I only abuse my poor friend here for Mycroft's benefit. I'm actually quite good." He played a few sweet notes for corroboration, and then motioned for John to sit down in his usual chair. "Any requests from the audience?"

John shuffled his feet, smiling. "I'm, er, not really overly familiar with instrumental…stuff. I—"

Sherlock scoffed, but this time it was a familiar, not unkind sound. "Don't fret. I know what you'll like."

"Of course you will." Suddenly feeling exhausted, John settled back into his chair, watching as Sherlock readied himself to play, putting himself in a pose so disciplined and perfect that it belonged on the cover of a music catalogue, not in the middle of a messy sitting room—

And then Sherlock began to play, almost instantly mesmerizing John and erasing whatever thoughts that had been occupying his mind a moment before. The detective's angular body suddenly became liquid, all motion. The music that escaped the instrument was practically indescribable, although at the same time it spoke with more clarity and emotion than Sherlock ever could have allowed himself to in a situation like this. It spoke of bittersweet, somewhat marred or shameful happiness, and it immediately apologized for any sweet note with a long and dismal one. It said, very coherently, _'I'm sorry that something has happened to make you unhappy. I'm sorry that _I'm _happy. But I'd very much like you to be happy with me. We can figure something out, can't we?'_

And by the way he closed his eyes and settled even more comfortably into his chair, John replied, _'Yes, I think we can. Don't worry, everything's fine. Let's just neither one of us run off for a bit, see if that helps any. I think it might.'_

The next time John opened his eyes, Sherlock was gone. He'd left a note stuck to the microwave of all places, saying that it was time for him to put the results of the ear experiment into practice. John didn't quite know what that was supposed to mean, and that was good. He was better off not understanding _everything _his flat-mate did or said. Despite their ability to sometimes speak very clearly through glances and hints at meanings, it was good to know that they would still always baffle each other now and then. And besides that, it was good to know that, no matter what had been revealed earlier this afternoon, their dynamic hadn't been too irreparably damaged. In maybe an hour or so, Sherlock would surely come bursting back into the flat with a wild look—maybe he would need John's mobile, or perhaps he would drag John bodily to a pub and force him to pretend to flirt with the sister of a drug-dealer while Sherlock listened for information—and all would be forgiven and forgotten. And while he didn't want to think of the idea of a continued healthy relationship with Sherlock as a consolation prize for losing Sarah, John was nonetheless consoled. If he belonged in Sherlock's world, as Sarah suggested, then damn it, he was going to enjoy every bit of it.


	3. Plotting

**Title:** "His Chief of Staff is Colonel Sebastian Moran."  
**Pairing/Characters:** Iffy, not-quite-there Jim/Sebastian  
**Rating:** PG-13  
**Word count:** A little under 3000 words.  
**Summary:** Sebastian gets a visit from his friend Jim, who wants to talk about a mutal friend (enemy?) of theirs.  
**Warnings:** Hm Un-Beta'd and Un-Britpicked. Some cursing. Spoilers for S1 in general. See a mistake, please tell me so I can fix it. Thanks. 3 (Also, I fear that the dreaded OOC-ness may have crept in, but I think it might be okay...)  
**Disclaimer:** I own nothing but the positioning of the words. :)  
**Notes: **Set at some point between The Blind Banker and The Great Game. Mainly written because I _freaked out _when Sherlock introduced John to a guy _who was frakking named Sebastian._ So there you go.

* * *

It was getting damn close to being time to pack up for the day when Sebastian's intercom receiver buzzed. "Sir?"

Sighing, he set down the papers he'd been lazily mulling over and pressed the button. "Yes, Shelly?" he answered with feigned joviality.

"Sir, you've got a visitor."

"What? It's almost closing time! Does he have—"

"He says he hasn't got an appointment, sir, but he says you'll _want _to see him. He's—he's rather insistent, sir."

And right there, there was a very particular _something _in the woman's voice that gave Sebastian pause. It wasn't quite fear, but…caution. Wariness. The edge of suspicion.

"I see. Send him up, Shelly," he practically sighed.

"Yes, sir. Thank you, sir."

Another buzz of the intercom marked the end of the connection.

Sebastian ran a hand down his face, and then sat back in his expensive chair, leaning far enough back to prop his legs up on the desk. Best to look as nonchalant as possible around the likes of his visitor. One wouldn't want to look intimidated if one could help it. Not that anyone was capable of _fooling _his visitor, but there's a certain peace of mind that comes with futility.

Only taking a minute, his visitor entered the room wearing a wide smile, along with what had to be the _gayest _outfit Sebastian had ever seen outside of a TV screen, let alone on a man of such professional vanity as this one. Interest piqued, Sebastian took his feet off the desk and leaned forward. "Why_ hello,_ Jim."

Silent question posed, Jim looked down at himself—v-cut T-shirt, hip-hugging skinny jeans, green underwear and all—and laughed. "You like the view, Sebastian?" he asked, rolling his hips a little, a mockingly flirty look on his face. There was something wrong with his voice, Sebastian noticed; he'd added an unfamiliar, enthusiastic, casual twang to it—to go with the costume, no doubt.

"Oh, definitely. May I ask who're you dressing up for, buddy? Certainly this…_get-up _isn't for _my_ benefit." He smiled. Sebastian had a special smile for dealing with Jim, one that was patently both non-threatening and non-threatened at the same time. He imagined it was something like engaging an outwardly-placid wild animal. It could bite at any time with little to no warning.

"Ohh," said Jim, "just a friend. A mutual friend, actually. I want to talk to you about him." He twirled his hips a bit more as he spoke, the hem of his skimpy shirt riding up to reveal a flash of pale belly. Then he paused and considered Sebastian, tapping his lips with his forefinger. "Aren't you going to ask me to sit down, Basty?"

Sebastian rolled his eyes. "You don't usually wait to be asked," he replied, motioning towards the chair at the front of his desk before leaning back again and replacing his stocking feet on the wood finish. Jim followed suit, mimicking Sebastian's pose, positioning their legs so that the two closest to each other touched fully. He gave the closest approximation to a content smile of which he was capable, folding his hands over his chest.

Seeing as Jim seemed happy to just sit there and offer no further explanations, Sebastian prompted, "So, Jim, do you mind if I ask a series of questions?"

"I love it when you do," said Jim, not for a moment allowing his affected persona to lapse. "It's one of the many reasons I like you, you know; you always give me a reason to hear the sound of my own voice."

"Why don't you just talk to yourself, then?" This was the game they played, after all—talk until you've said too much, walk until you've overstepped a line. Mock until you've angered the psychopath.

Jim's black eyes flashed in the fluorescent light. "Well, that's not quite the same, is it? That's like the difference between getting hand-job and _wanking_, isn't it?" There was that tight, deliberate smile again, so close to turning into a teeth-showing grin. "That was the first question in the series thereof, then? Do go on, love."

Sebastian didn't want to admit it, but damn it, he fidgeted uncomfortably in his seat. "Right, well, first things first—"

"Second things second," Jim corrected.

Sebastian waved him off. "Never mind counting. Jim. Is it safe for you to be, you know, out and about? Don't you usually prefer to stay hidden in the Bat Cave?"

"I think you mean Arkham Asylum," Jim replied, sounding bored, moving his leg against Sebastian's. Sebastian fidgeted again—damn it—and (hopefully subtly) slid his leg a few inches away. Jim was usually a pretty tactile person, always touching others as some strange show of dominance, but his seemed different—like he was attempting to stay in character. "As for whether or not I'm safe…well, as they say, the best hiding places are in plain sight. My theory is that when I'm dressed like this, I'll be disregarded by the exact people I hope will disregard me." He paused and slid his thin leg back into contact with Sebastian's, twisting his ankle so the side of his expensive boot rested on the older man's thigh. "But thank you for your concern. Did I answer many of the questions in your head?"

"You only really made me more eager to ask more."

"Oh good! Please do!"

Sebastian shrugged. "Well, if we're being honest…the only _important _question is, who's the mutual friend? I never imagined you had many besides me." Sebastian liked to do that—insult people and call them friends at the same time. He liked to gauge their reactions.

Jim's reaction…was pretty mild, actually. His dark eyes narrowed warningly, glinting, but nothing else happened. "If we're being honest, I'd suppose you'd call him…what's the opposite of a colleague?"

Sebastian shrugged.

"Well, he's _that_," Jim continued, undeterred. Then, suddenly, he glared at Sebastian in earnest and turned to shoot daggers all over the posh office. "Actually, he was in this very room not too long ago." His glare was no less than accusatory when it returned to Sebastian's face.

"Jim, wh—_wait._ You're not talking about—_Sherlock Holmes?_ My old schoolmate? _Really?_ What do you want with _him_?"

Jim still looked somewhat put-out, but also a little less murder-y. "He's getting in the way of business. In fact, when he was here, he helped ruin one of my investments. At _your _request, I might add. _Thanks _for that, Sebastian." Fuck, the murder-y look was back already. Time to punch the shark in the nose.

"That break-in-and-murder thing was _your _doing? Damn it, Jim! Ever think of, I don't know, _telling _me before you go and fund a crime that's going to affect _my_ business? I thought, being your so-called chief of staff, you might trust me with _that _kind of information."

Jim had the nerve to look _pouty_. "If I'd told you, you would have said no. But if I'd known you were going to call in _Sherlock Holmes_—"

Sebastian once again kicked his feet off the desk and replaced them with his elbows. "Jim, buddy, I don't think we talk enough. We've got communication issues in our relationship." He tried _not _to speak as though he was dealing with a small child, but _damn _the idea was tempting. "Look at it from my point of view: somebody breaks into my office, they leave a damn scribble on a portrait, and an employee goes missing. What am I going to do? Am I going to assume that _every _crime _ever _is the doing of my best mate who happens to be the head of a criminal organization, or am I going to ask for help? I have an easily-contactable old schoolmate with a neat parlor-trick, so obviously the latter is the better choice, seeing as my mate is damn difficult to get a hold of. Really, what do you _expect _of me?"

Jim's eyes were little more than slits, blacked out by his full eyelashes. "I _expect _you to lose that tone. I didn't come here to argue with you, Sebastian."

Sebastian rolled his chair back and stood to pace. "No, you came to talk about Sherlock bloody Holmes. Jim, do you really think that weirdo is anything to get your"—he paused—"bright green knickers in a bunch over?"

Jim's black eyes followed Sebastian as he moved about the office. "I think I already answered that question. He poses himself as a severe detriment to my business."

"So, what, you need to, I don't know, _get at _him?"

"Yes, more or less. Do you object? He's _your _old schoolmate."

'_Damn him,' _thought Sebastian. _'It should be illegal to look and sound so collected in a situation like this. Not that Jim'd care, but…still.'_

"Well. Um. No? I guess not? I mean, it's not like we were ever _friends_, but…do you really want to…?" He left the sentence hanging on purpose, because far be it from him to ever try to predict what went on in Jim's mind.

"Kill him? Well yes, eventually, I think, at least after I've gotten to play with him for a little while longer. For my troubles, I'd really love to drive him completely insane before we get to that point." His quick flash of a grin gave Sebastian chills up and down his spine, despite the fact that he should have been years past being affected by his mate's…creepiness.

"So why are you talking to _me_? Do you need _help _getting at Sherlock? I can tell you all his contact info—"

"No, I have access to all that sort of information. No, what I need help with is getting to the _man. _I'm still looking for ways to _hurt _him, to see if I can get him to leave my business alone by his own will." His brow had furrowed by now, his tight little eyebrows knitting over his wide, unsettling eyes.

Sebastian had the good graces to drop his gaze and shuffle his feet. "Well, I don't think you'll get to the _man _dressed like _that_. I'm not sure exactly _what _Sherlock does with his under-things, but I'm pretty certain he doesn't go for _camp_. For a while at Uni, for instance, he sort of went out with this one bloke, real sensible guy name Victor—"

Jim started and pointed at Sebastian. "There! That's what I mean. Victor…?"

"Victor Trevor. Just a guy I always used to see Sherlock with back then."

"Is he someone I could use?"

Sebastian had to stop himself from shivering at the word 'use', because he knew exactly what Jim meant by it. "Don't think so, buddy. Dead men don't make great hostages."

Jim considered this before relaxing again. "Well, no matter. The point is, that's the sort of information I'm after. Things I can use." And then, just now remembering Sebastian's 'camp' comment, he laughed his semi-cruel laugh. "And don't get the wrong ideas about this outfit, Basty. I don't _want _Sherlock to go for me when I wear it. I already told you; I want him to _disregard _me."

Sebastian clenched and unclenched both his hands a few times. "You know, buddy, you seem to have this whole damn plan pretty well worked out in that genius head of yours. Can I ask why you bothered to come all this way to talk at all?"

Jim stood then and walked up to Sebastian, close enough that their body heat mingled. "Maybe I just wanted to talk? Didn't I already answer that question, too? You really should pay attention when I speak, Basty; I've got such a pretty voice."

Sebastian bared his teeth in what could have been as much a grimace as it was a grin. "You really like playing this part, don't you? Have you found a new favorite role, Jimmy?"

Jim's eyes crinkled in an almost non-threatening smile. "You think you're so funny," he said almost fondly.

"You think you're so scary," Sebastian offered.

Jim shrugged. "I've been told that I am."

Sebastian didn't doubt it. "And I've been told that I'm funny. We've reached an impasse, I think."

Jim's smile said he didn't believe in impasses. He reached forward and inexplicably ran his hands down Sebastian's lapels, seemingly to smooth them out, although Sebastian was certain that this was just another power-play. He'd never met anyone before or after Jim that unnerved him this much even when they were behaving rather innocuously. Sherlock was an oddball, yes, but a more or less harmless oddball. Used his powers for good and all that. On the other hand, if anyone ever called Jim harmless, Sebastian would have had to laugh in their face. A rabid wolf was more harmless than Jim Morgan—or _Moriarty_, as was his stage-name.

When Jim's hands fluttered close to Sebastian's hips, Sebastian was pulled out of his reverie and coughed out, unbidden, "John Watson."

Jim met Sebastian's gaze with wide, excited eyes, hands frozen where they were. "What was that?"

"John Watson. Sherlock's new little…_thing_. He called him a friend, except Sherlock doesn't have friends. The fact that he sees this John fellow as one—_well._ The point is, the man probably wouldn't disappoint you if you tried to find a use for him." He paused, floundering a bit. "You could call him use_ful_, maybe."

Jim's face lit up like that little boy from that one American Christmas film—when he finally got that toy gun he wanted so badly. "Oh, _Sebastian! _Now that is exactly the sort of thing I was hoping you would tell me! I can _work _with a _friend!" _There was suddenly and briefly the sensation of lips at the corner of Sebastian's mouth, affectionate in a possessive kind of way. And then Jim had backed off, beginning to pace around the room himself—but out of excitement and sadistic restlessness, not discomfort.

"I'm pretending to date a girl who works at Barts, you see. Sherlock sometimes goes there to use the lab, she told me. I'm going to make a chance to meet him soon, to observe him up close. Oh, what _fun!_ I'll keep an eye on this John man too, if you think he's promising." He laughed then, sudden and _ecstatic. _"Oh, it's _Christmas!" _

"Um," said Sebastian, eloquently. "Glad to make you happy, I guess." He paused and watched his friend a little longer. "Is that it, then? Because I—"

Jim laughed again and put his hands on his skinny hips. "Why, Basty, you'd think you wanted to be rid of me!" Before getting an answer, though, Jim checked his wristwatch. "Tsk! It's just as well; Molly and I have a date in a few. She's a sad little bird, you know, and dense too—she's not picking up on _any _of my costume's hints."

"Sounds infuriating."

"Would be, would be, if she didn't like talking about our friend Sherlock so much. He's all she ever seems to really want to talk about…she's never mentioned this John fellow, though. Hmm. Oh! Before I forget"—he rummaged a bit in the back pocket of his tight, expensive jeans, and pulled out a thick wad of folded papers—"when's the next time you're in Hong Kong?"

"Two weeks. Why?"

Jim laughed again; he was just full of bubbles today. "Why else? I've got a few men I'd like you to shoot with that fancy gun of yours." The expression he pulled right then was obviously meant to be entreating, but it didn't quite hit its mark with Sebastian.

"Oh come on, Jim, you know how much I hate trying to get that thing through security. You've got a whole team of snipers in your pocket; can't you just send one of them?"

Jim shook his head with a tragic frown. "I really can't." He held the papers—the death warrants—out closer to his friend. "True, I've got a whole team, but _you're _the best of the whole lot of them. You're the only one I can _really _trust to never get caught and betray me." The little weasel of a man fluttered his dark eyelashes, trying to force Sebastian to agree to the job by sheer force of will.

It worked. It always worked. Sebastian stepped closer and took the papers. "I bet you say that to _all _the boys," he mumbled, unfolding them and studying the photographs of his targets.

Jim shrugged and smiled and patted Sebastian on the cheek. And then he was gone, no doubt to give poor Shelly one more unhinged smile, and then off to traumatize whoever this poor Molly was.

'_God help Sherlock Holmes,' _Sebastian thought half-heartedly. '_He's a dead man walking. Him and John Watson both. They're so fucking screwed.'_

He looked out his treacherous window for a second. It was fully dark now, the city lit only by its own buildings' lights.

'_Not that I'd ever do anything to get in Jim's way. I couldn't ever betray him like that, just like he said. He fucking owns me.'_

He refolded the papers and put them in the inner pocket of his suit-jacket, moving towards his desk to pack up for the night.

'_And I don't mind at all. I'm as crazy as he is.'_


	4. Goddess

**Title:** Greek Goddess Says What?  
**Pairing/Characters:** John, Anthea  
**Rating:** G  
**Word count:** about 800  
**Summary:** John tries to guess at Anthea's real name, with less-than-satisfactory results.  
**Warnings:** None, except for perhaps a passing spoiler for TGG. Also, this is Un-Beta'd and Un-Brit-Picked. Please point out any mistakes! ;)  
**Disclaimer:** I own nothing but the positioning of the words. :)

* * *

After the pool incident, John got pretty used to getting spirited away by Mycroft's assistant to go talk to the elder Holmes. Mycroft had more or less decided that, having nearly lost his little brother, he was going to learn what Sherlock was up to whether he had to pay for a spy or not. John didn't really mind after a while. If it in any way helped keep Sherlock even infinitesimally more safe, then it was worth any annoyance it brought anyone.

He was especially grateful for the pick-up today, because it was a damn monsoon out, and Sherlock had run off with the only umbrella. John would have to lecture Sherlock about that sometime once he got home. He was serious about the fact that they had to do their very best to stick together from now on. For now, though, he was content to hop into the warm black car and rest his protesting leg a little.

'Anthea' was there, of course. She was past even looking up from her mobile when John got in; she'd learned to recognize and remember him, but she was also quite bored of him. For a reason that was perhaps a little childish, this fact always made John more eager to try and talk to her. He'd even prepared a little this time.

He leant a little sideways to close a tiny bit of the distance between them, and without any pretext asked, "Is your real name Athena?"

She started almost imperceptibly and looked up briefly to give him a crooked eyebrow that said, very clearly, _'Who do you think you are, and why do you always insist on saying things to me?' _But what she said out loud was, "Um. Excuse me? What are you talking about?"

Her eyes were back on the screen of her mobile by the time John took his next breath, but he was not derailed. "The first time we met, you said your name was Anthea. But then you said it wasn't. So…yeah."

Her brows furrowed, but she didn't look up. "Did I? I forget. If you say so."

"Right. So, is your name Athena?"

"Nope." She made a little popping noise on the _P_ and typed a few quick words into her keyboard. "And really, if I was going to use a pseudonym, don't you think I'd make it a little more complex than just moving around one letter? You _do _understand the sort of people I work with, right?" All this time she didn't look up, and somehow this felt more condescending than her earlier strange look, especially seeing as this was the longest collection of words she'd ever presented him.

"I concede your point," John said in order to keep himself from saying _'touché'. _As it was, she didn't reply.

A minute later, however, she broke the awkward silence by laughing, quick and unbidden. "And who names their daughter _Athena_, anyway?"

John grinned and looked out the window to hide it. "You _do _realize that you work for a man called _Mycroft_, don't you? And that his younger brother's name is _Sherlock?_ Not exactly a great basis for comparison."

He heard her begrudging scoff, followed by a few dozen more soft clicks of her mobile's keyboard. "Touché," she said, and he bristled. "But then, _you're _called _John_, so I suppose everything balances out."

"Suppose it does." A beat of silence, in which John looked back at his companion. "So I wasn't even close?"

Her eyes flicked to his and away again. "No, you really weren't. Don't worry your head over it, though. It doesn't really matter what you call me, seeing as we only ever see each other when my boss decides to be nosy." She paused, her entire focus on her mobile for a few seconds. Then: "You could call me _Mary_ or something if you wanted to, but it wouldn't change the fact that the car's parked and it's time for you to go."

John jumped a little and looked out the window again—they'd reached an abandoned car-park, with almost intentionally gloomy low lighting and still-heavy rain. A bit hammy, really. John scoffed.

"Mind telling me what he wants to ask this time?" John asked, putting his hand on the door handle, stalling to preserve some precious time of dryness.

"Yes," she replied, not even glancing at him this time.

He promptly got out, willing to take the hint, but looked back to give her a quick smile. "See you later then, _Mary_," he said, hoping to joke, although he would have been happy to just annoy.

Her eyes slid languidly to his, giving him an acidic look that said she was going to forget him and this conversation as soon as he shut the car door.

Sighing, he shut the car door.


	5. Tantrum

**Title:** SMASH Goes the Expensive Electronic  
**Pairing/Characters:** Sherlock/John preslash  
**Rating:** PG  
**Word count:** A little under 1500 words.  
**Summary:** A case goes badly. Sherlock is unwontedly upset. John tries to comfort.  
**Warnings:** Hm Un-Beta'd and Un-Britpicked. A smidge of cussing. Not many spoilers at all.  
**Disclaimer:** I own nothing but the positioning of the words. :)  
**Notes: **This was one of those situations where I got a couple of sentences stuck in my head that wouldn't leave me alone until I wrote them down. So yeah. Enjoy!

* * *

Sherlock threw open the front door of the flat with much more force than called-for and marched up the seventeen stairs without even a backwards glance to John, who was left to inspect the abused inner wall for cracks. Luckily, there were none, although he still apologized quickly to Mrs. Hudson, who came out of her room with a stricken look on her kindly face.

"John, dear? Whatever is wrong with Sherlock?"

John's eyes followed Sherlock's path up the stairs, and he sighed, exhausted both mentally and physically. "We hit a bit of a dead end in our case," he explained lamely.

"What sort of dead end?"

John ran a weary hand over his face, and then stepped closer to lay that same hand on the older woman's arm. "The literal sort. Our client killed herself instead of letting Sherlock do his job. Her testimony was the only corroboration any of his investigations had to go on." He bit his lower lip. "Sherlock's a bit upset, you see."

Mrs. Hudson let out a concerned little breath of air. "My Lord." She looked at the stairs leading to the sitting room. "Would you like me to go up and make some tea for the poor dear?"

John squeezed her arm gratefully. "Thank you, but no. You're not our housekeeper. No, I'll make it. I need to talk to him, anyway. He's…in a bad place."

"I'm sure." She nodded. "Godspeed," she murmured as she slipped back into her room.

"Thanks," John mumbled, staring at the stairs, trying to find some sort of motivation to climb them.

He found it when he heard a crash.

"Sherlock!" he shouted as he ran up the steps, but once he saw what was going on in the sitting room, he stopped dead in his tracks, gasping quietly, gently.

Sherlock had thrown his coat and muffler carelessly onto the floor, and now he stood in the center of the room, hands clenched, glaring at an electrical mess on the floor. His teeth were bared, his face as stiff as the rest of his body.

"Is that my laptop?" John asked too loudly, looking with no small amount of shock at the cracked and broken thing, the two plastic rectangle pieces a few inches away from each other, the hinges reduced to shattered bits of plastic and wires. Some coolant and gel leaked out from the ruined screen. "Sherlock, did you just _destroy _my laptop?"

Sherlock's head snapped up so quickly that John was almost surprised he didn't crack his neck with the sheer ferocity of the motion. "Mycroft will buy you a new one for the price of one phone-call," he spat, shooting enough daggers at John with his eyes that the doctor actually got gooseflesh. John opened his mouth to respond, but abruptly Sherlock was moving, pacing about the flat like a caged tiger. "Damn!" he shouted suddenly, causing John to jump. "Damn it all! Damn this whole city and every idiot who lives in it!" He knocked over a stack of papers on a side-table—evidence he'd collected over the past week against the man who'd been harassing his client. "They're all stupid, bloody idiots! The depend on me for _everything_, but then they don't even _trust _me to get the job done!"

John clasped his hands together to keep the left one from shuddering. "Let me make you some tea," said John, moving cautiously towards the kitchen. What he meant, of course, by _'let me make you some tea' _was _'I trust you, Sherlock, with everything I have and everything I am, _but Sherlock was not in the right state of mind to understand.

"Damn the tea! Damn this whole _country _of idiots! The only people with any _sense _in this whole bloody country are the criminals, and it's my lot in life to get _rid _of them! This is all so pointless, this whole practice so _worthless—"_

"_Sherlock!" _John shouted, drawing on all the strength of voice he'd learned in the army hospital camp. "Stop this right now, Sherlock!" Surprisingly, Sherlock froze, staring at John with wide, vacant, red-rimmed eyes. "Don't _talk _like that, Sherlock," John admonished a little more gently. "Please."

"Why not?" Sherlock shot back like a petulant child.

John's face was so very open, Sherlock usually had no problem reading the doctor's emotions and predicting what was going to come out of his mouth. There were not infrequent moments, however, when John would go against all of Sherlock's expectations and bloody well _surprise _him.

For example, right now John _should _have looked utterly furious and put-out by Sherlock's childishness, but he didn't. Instead, he looked…disappointed. As though Sherlock was failing some all-important test that was a secret to all but John. And instead of a mindless, anger-fueled response, John said, very calmly, "Because it isn't _like you_, Sherlock." And he said it as if he was an authority on the subject, as if he understood the study of "What Sherlock Holmes Is Like" better than Sherlock did himself.

'_Oh, hang it all for a fucking lark,' _thought Sherlock, despairingly. _'He probably does. Damn him. Bless him.'_

Sherlock seemed to sag a little, both in body and in spirit, and without really seeming to think about it, John rushed forward and caught his friend around the middle, supporting him. He walked Sherlock (who had gone slightly limp in any combination of depression, peevishness, or exhaustion) to the sofa, goading him to sit down. Sherlock didn't offer any protest, but he did lean back against the cushions, trapping John's arm around his waist. John knew better than to object. Instead he sat down himself and pulled Sherlock towards him, freeing his arm so he could wrap both of them around the taller man's broad shoulders. One hand crept into Sherlock's dark mess of curls, pressing the detective's forehead into the doctor's shoulder. Sherlock melted easily into the position, nearly all of the tension in his lithe body disappearing. He placed his long, thin hands on either side of John's ribcage and sighed pathetically into his friend's neck.

"There you go," John murmured senselessly, running a hand absently through his friend's hair. "Everything's going to be alright." He knew Sherlock hated hearing such banal sorts of things, but spending an entire childhood with an emotional wreck like Harry had given him certain instincts to go with certain situations.

"I'm sorry," Sherlock replied, his voice just as low if not more. His fingers twitched in John's jumper, bunching up and smoothing out the warm fabric in two quick motions. "About…your laptop. I won't make Mycroft replace it. I'll pay for a new one myself."

And since John knew Sherlock was apologizing for more than just the busted laptop, he said, "No, there's no need to do that. Mycroft's got money for a reason, doesn't he?" His lips brushed Sherlock's hair as he spoke. He should have been embarrassed about that, but he wasn't.

Sherlock shifted a little, wrapping his ridiculously long arms tightly around John's middle, burying his face in the jumper. John felt his back being pressed more fully into the sofa's frame, but he didn't resist, because before he could even register that he should have disliked this position, Sherlock distracted him by murmuring, "Is the offer for tea still valid?"

He lifted his face then, and he looked much less vulnerable, much more in control. His eyes were still slightly red and puffy, but instead of glaring vaguely into space, they were looking with intense focus into John's. Sherlock was back.

John couldn't contain the sigh of relief that escaped his lips. "I guess so, if you want it now," he said, which meant, _'Of course it is.'_

Sherlock nodded once, his eyes never leaving John's. But then the emotions hovering between and flowing through the two of them became too much for Sherlock and he had to disengage, pushing away from John and standing. He walked into the kitchen at the same time John did, although Sherlock left it holding a broom and dustbin as John set the water to boil.

"I won't forget to call Mycroft about the laptop," Sherlock called out from the sitting room, which caused John to suddenly realize, _holy shit_, Sherlock was cleaning up his own mess! The temperature in Hell had to be getting close to zero centigrade by now.

"You better not," John called back, but it was obvious by the way his voice shuddered that he meant, _'Thank you. And don't worry, things _will _get better.'_


	6. Excess

**Title**: And I Came Upon a Doctor  
**Pairing/Characters**: Sherlock/John pre-pre-slash  
**Rating**: PG-13  
**Word count:** just over 3150  
**Summary**: Taking place directly after (my perception of) the end of The Great Game, Sherlock angsts over the fact that John's in the hospital, and John (basically) tells him to quit it. (Takes place in the same universe as all my other fics, but can be read totally alone.)  
**Warnings:** I think like, one or two cuss words? Also, spoilers. And this is un-Beta'd and un-Britpicked. See a mistake, point it out! :D  
**Disclaimer**: NOT MINE, except for the position of the words.

**Also:**

_And I came upon a doctor  
Who appeared in quite poor health.  
I said, "There's nothing I can do for you  
You can't do for yourself."  
He said, "Oh, yes you can, just hold my hand.  
I think that that would help."  
So I sat with him a while  
And I asked him how he felt.  
He said, "I think I'm cured.  
No, in fact I'm sure.  
Thank you stranger,  
For your therapeutic smile."_

-"Bowl of Oranges" by Bright Eyes

* * *

There were times when Sherlock thought that it would be awfully convenient to literally crawl under a rock for an hour or six—to entirely defend his mind against the cacophony of information always barraging his senses, to finally have some _peace _without feeling the compulsion to know _everything _about _everything _around him. How divine that would be: to lay back for once in his life with an empty head—no arch enemies, no bomb-vests, no serial killers. It would have been dull after a while, of course, but he wasn't asking for a lifetime of empty-headedness. Just a little while. Just long enough to reset the hard-drive, to rest the hardware, deplorable as the idea seemed at first. Actually, if he had any sense of self-preservation at all, he would take this mental break _immediately_.

Because, with a full, busy, and restless mind, Sherlock was having a difficult time comprehending (or, rather, _accepting) _exactly what was in front of his eyes at this very moment: John Watson laying prostrate in an ill-fitting gown on one of those stiff, crinkly beds that one only found in hospitals. His eyes were closed, and he looked more exhausted than Sherlock had ever seen him—bags under his eyes standing out more than usual, the lines around his mouth deeper and seemingly more strained. Sherlock didn't want to allow himself to think that John looked older, because that was so cliché, but it was true. And maybe it was trite, but Sherlock couldn't help blaming himself—it _was _his fault, after all, no matter how much Sherlock tried to rationalize that he had no power over other people's actions, that it was pointless to worry about cause-and-effect at this point in time, but—well, he really needed a little down-time, a little non-Sherlock time if her was going to allow his mind to go down that path.

Frankly, no matter what path his mind followed, he came to the same destination, so really what was the point? John had been shot—shot in his _bad _shoulder, damn and bless—after knocking Sherlock and himself into The Pool. The snipers apparently did not appreciate the fact that, moments earlier, Sherlock had taken a shot at the bomb—the blast of which, _somehow, _Jim Moriarty seemed to have escaped, if the lack of blood, guts, and limbs was to be trusted. So the snipers rained bullets down on Sherlock and John as they held their desperate breath. Only one bullet found purchase—in John's left shoulder, as mentioned. And the fact that John had been harmed made Sherlock sick, really physically sick, as only a stomach virus in the sixth form had ever done before.

And now John seemed to be in a not-quite-coma. The double-trauma to the area had encouraged the doctors put John on a mild sedative during the first several hours of recovery, but that had run out at least an hour ago; now the doctors said that John would wake up 'when his body was ready.' Which was meaningless to Sherlock, of course. He'd been waiting tirelessly at John's bedside, allowed to stay only because of the shock-blanket that Sherlock kept obstinately wrapped around his shoulders.

Well, strike that, it wasn't the _only _reason; it may have also had something to do with the government ID card that Mycroft had flashed earlier on, but Sherlock didn't have room in his cluttered mind for his brother. Yes, Mycroft had more or less rescued the two of them—directing a Special Operations team onto the scene before the pool could become an all-out bloodbath—but not even the elder Holmes could make John wake up any faster. The unconscious doctor was severely trying Sherlock's patience, but the detective couldn't even get properly irritated about it because of the stupid, gnawing _guilt _that had settled belligerently in the pit of his stomach, feeding on all the more useful aspects of his being.

Finally, Sherlock could take no more of this bad-metaphor-inducing tension without some sort of intervention or buffer. So, drawing on examples from a few of the romantic comedies he'd had to sit through in John and Mrs. Hudson's company, he reached out and, minding the IV, captured John's nearest limp hand in both of his own. "I wonder if you'd do me the very great kindness of considering the possibility of waking up. Come on now, John." He leant in, pitching his words lower, so no outside party could possibly overhear. "There's nothing wrong anymore. You're going to be absolutely and blessedly alright." His hands twitched, squeezing around John's. "I'm not ashamed to barter or beg. I'll actually _buy milk_. And beans. Anything you want. All _you _have to do is open your eyes within the next…_thirty _minutes, and that's being generous with my patience. What do you think?"

John said nothing. The various vital-sign-monitors beeped and pulsed good-naturedly, but Sherlock was not appeased. Despite his assertions otherwise, he was very nearly too proud to be pleading with and attempting to coerce an unconscious man. But this _was John_, so vanity would have to hang for a little bit. He'd take it back later, when the reboot was done.

"John, you know, it's been much too long since I last heard your voice. So, if you would kindly open your eyes and mouth, I'd dearly like to ask you a few questions. For instance, did _he _hurt you in any way? Are you going to be alright once you wake up? And I don't mean in a physical sense, because your medical brethren say that you're going to make a full recovery in _that _sense, if given proper rest. How's this—if you wake up now, I'll give you proper rest later, much as I abhor the idea of idleness. I'll behave. I'll be sensitive. Just—just do as I _ask._"

If real life were as romantic as certain pointedly unconscious parties thought it should be, the next line would read, _'Unable to deny anything Sherlock asked for so earnestly, John stirred.' _However, the human body rarely cares about what outside observers want from it, so John remained silent and still—much to Sherlock's disdain.

"You've spoiled me, John," Sherlock continued, shaking his head with a wry smile. "The skull never replied to me when I spoke to it, but you've always got something to offer in response. I've gotten too used it. So, what do I have to say to get you to respond? Do you want to hear a few little deductions?"

John said nothing—Sherlock decided to take his silence as confirmation.

"Your nurse, the one with the close-cropped black hair? She's contemplating divorcing her husband despite the fact that she's recently discovered that she's pregnant with his child."

John did not look the least bit impressed.

"And your doctor?" Sherlock continued, undeterred. "With the pince-nez glasses? He'd very much like to sleep with his new intern, but he's put off by the fact that his intern is both ten years his junior _and _a fellow male."

John perhaps would have looked scandalized if he'd been awake, but he wasn't, so he didn't.

Sherlock fidgeted in his seat, squeezing John's hand again, uncomfortable. He stared, then, at his hands—his own long, pale, bare hands—and could barely wrap his mind around the fact that they were his own. It didn't compute with all the other information Sherlock knew about himself. He didn't get caught up in—in _people_, not like this, never to the extent that his mind couldn't function without severe deliberation. It was disconcerting—no, _terrifying_. But there was no stopping it, not from Sherlock's end of it, at least.

"But I suppose I could be wrong about that," Sherlock continued, directionless now, voice so low that John, had he been awake, would have had to strain his ears to hear. "I was wrong about—about _him_, wasn't I? And look where's that's gotten us."

John was meant to stir there, too—to open his eyes and say that didn't blame Sherlock for anything that had happened and that Sherlock shouldn't either. But that wasn't going to happen, realistically speaking. Sherlock and John had not been on the very best terms when John had left to be kidnapped. John would most definitely blame Sherlock. Forgiveness would not come easily. Sherlock would surely be too ashamed and yet somehow too proud to apologize for what he'd caused to happen while John was awake. John would move away from Baker Street. He found excitement in danger, but Sherlock doubted that John would have appreciated this most recent adventure—or, better phrased, this most recent catastrophe.

Resigned to his fate, Sherlock curled in on himself, resting his forehead beside his and John's tangled fingers, sighing.

It was then that whatever on-looking higher power there was—if any at all—decided to finally smile upon Sherlock and forgive him his sins. John's fingers trembled, brushing against Sherlock's oh-so-gently. Sherlock sat up ramrod straight as soon as he registered the sensation. He stared down at John's face, which had slightly changed in the two minutes since the last time he'd looked at it. His brow had furrowed slightly, and his lips pursed the way they always did when he was confused. Ah!John was disoriented!

'_Poor love', _Sherlock imagined someone saying. He couldn't very well say it himself, but _someone _should have; it would have fit the slightly self-deprecatingly corny atmosphere Sherlock imagined had permeated the private hospital room in the last hour or so.

"About time," he said, louder than before, smoothing John's growing-less-limp hand between his palms. "Do you have any idea how bored I've been?"

"Fuck," John croaked, squeezing his tired eyes even more tightly closed. "I'm sure it's been awful," he continued, allowing one eye to creak open, and then the other. His squinting gaze immediately sought Sherlock, who was watching his friend's face intently for any ill signs.

"It has been," Sherlock answered evenly, although the fact that his voice trembled and that his eyes could not leave John's betrayed his deep, unbidden emotions. He hoped John's sleep-addled mind would miss it.

As hoped, John blessedly decided to ignore Sherlock's lack of usual composure. "So we're alive, then? Did we win?"

"Yes and not quite." The response came out in a rush, not nearly as cool as it had sounded in the detective's mental voice. "But we don't need to talk about that right now. How do you feel? I should call a nurse, you know, let them know you're awake now—"

Finally, _oh finally_, John's fingers curled around Sherlock's of their own volition. "Slow down, Sherlock," he breathed, closing his eyes again and settling down more comfortably into the bed. "You don't need to call anyone yet. Five minutes won't—won't change anything. I'm fine."

_Fine._ It was always _fine _with John—such an imprecise word, such a useless adjective. To a person like Sherlock, who thrived on definite details and facts, _fine _was practically meaningless.

But John was _talking. _He was _awake._ Granted, the bitterness and sense of distrust would surely—inevitably—invade John's tone soon, but for now—_oh!_ For now, John was talking like there was nothing wrong, like everything _was _fine. The relief that these little facts elicited from Sherlock seemed frankly excessive, but he couldn't help it. He should have been able to help it, but—

John's voice broke through the veil of emotion: "Are you alright, Sherlock?" Ah, goodness, he still didn't sound angry or accusatory in the least. This was just cruel—like when you knew a doctor was about to pop your dislocated arm back into place, but he wouldn't tell you exactly _when._

"Oh course I'm alright," he snapped, and then cringed at his unintentional tone of voice. "I mean—I—I'm not the one who was shot, much to our enemies' likely disappointment." He smiled to soften his voice, but it fled quickly when John started in shock, his eyes snapping open to look at his own left shoulder. Sherlock made a small noise in the back of his throat; the pose obstructed his view of John's face. The noise was just the slightest bit louder when John stole his hand back from Sherlock to prod at the bandages he obviously had not noticed until now.

"Damn," John muttered. "I'd been hoping it was just residual pain from—from Afghanistan."

"No," Sherlock replied, voice low again to hide the remorse. And then, just to defy his self-directed worries, he said, "I'm so sorry, John."

John glanced at Sherlock then, obviously sensing something _off _about the detective's countenance. "But…it's not _your _fault, Sherlock," he said slowly, attempting to measure his flat-mate to some extent, perhaps wanting to predict a possible reaction.

Sherlock fought, with more than his earlier success, to keep his voice even. "Yes, actually, it is."

Something akin to anger flashed in John's eyes. Someday Sherlock would be told exactly why what he'd said had struck such a nerve with John, but for now he was too lost inside his own head to deduce it. "_You _didn't shoot me."

"No, that's true."—and here some irritation crept in, irritation that John couldn't just accept that he should be angry with Sherlock—"You were shot by people who were _aiming _for me." He ground his teeth for a moment then, trying to quell the sudden rage that was rattling 'round his innards. Not to mention the sickness that was following closely at its heels.

John studied Sherlock's face for two seconds—far longer than Sherlock himself would have needed, he thought—before shrugging his good shoulder and saying, impassive, "Either way, it's better than being blown up."

Sherlock bit his tongue before he could say, _'If you'd gotten blown up, that still would have been my fault.' _Instead, he said, "That thing you did—pushing us into the pool, I mean—that…that was good, too."

John smiled, his eyes moving to his newly-free hand. Sherlock could tell John was debating whether or not to take his hand again. The detective remained perfectly still, unwilling to push John in either direction.

Finally making a decision, John clasped his own two hands together, saying, "Anytime."

And it was that little, casual response that did Sherlock in, forced him to finally exhale his metaphorical breath. Sherlock was a man of minutiae, and he could tell that by saying _'anytime', _John meant that he was not leaving, not going to rush off in a huff of anger, not this time, not yet. The detective imagined he ought to be trembling. This was why he didn't get caught up in other people—this raw, overwhelming emotion, the likes of which could be caused by the tiniest gestures and expressions, seemed just so _excessive. _Much too much. Dangerously so. It was these kinds of emotions that most commonly led people to violent crimes, after all. He had occupational reasons to object to these sorts of overpowering feelings.

But this was _John_, and John was waiting for a response, so Sherlock put a hand on his good shoulder and nodded. He tried to say, _'Me too, of course anytime for me too, anytime at all,' _with his eyes, and hoped John understood.

Two or so minutes later, Sherlock called the nurse into the room, and she called in the doctor; once they'd gone, Sherlock repeated his earlier deductions to the now possibly-appreciative John, who surprisingly and inexplicably laughed.

* * *

Sherlock held onto John's right elbow—his left arm was still in a sling—as they slowly mounted their seventeen stairs together for the first time since The Pool Incident. John's limp having unaccountably and irritatingly returned, Sherlock was willing to help John walk, but he wanted to keep that cane away from his friend as long as possible. It was a matter of principal as much as anything else.

"This is such a nice flat," said John, breathless, once they made it to the sitting room. "I'll never get over it. I'm so glad to be home."

Sherlock smiled slightly, standing uncertainly with his hand still on John's elbow. "I'm glad, too," he said, somewhat lamely. "It's been…quiet."

John smiled. He always had a smile for Sherlock, somehow. "You couldn't have missed me _that _much," he said, laughing now. "I swear you spent every minute of visiting hours with me, if not more."

Sherlock shrugged, finally letting go of John to take off his coat, and then to gently help John out of his. "There are reasons for everything I do," he offered at long last, folding the two coats over his arm before moving to toss them unceremoniously onto one of the kitchen chairs.

When he turned back, John had not moved an inch from where Sherlock had left him—his blue eyes were moving slowly over every little detail of the cluttered, homey flat. His attentive eyes couldn't have missed the fact that Sherlock had left John's laptop on the sofa, out and open. For some reason this fact caused John's brow to furrow, and when he looked at Sherlock, it was with a concerned, almost _guilty _expression.

"What is it?" Sherlock asked, sending a muddled glare at the offending laptop for wiping away John's comfortable grin.

"Nothing," John said quickly, and then: "It's just…I _really _didn't mean to offend you with anything I said in my blog." He paused, biting his lip as Sherlock stood staring and wondering why this worry had popped into John's oddly-frequently surprising little brain. Then he finally continued, "And if I wrote anything to make you think that _I _think you don't have a heart…I'll erase it. Because I didn't mean it. Okay? You just name it."

Ah, so this was a sentimental thing, then, brought on by Sherlock's recent behavior. Well. Okay. Sherlock didn't overmuch enjoy dealing with sentimentality, but for John he managed not to mind so much. Somehow.

Sherlock smiled, waving John off before coming forward to help John to his so-long-abandoned chair. "No need for that, John. I'm better off if people think that I'm heartless—that way they don't think I have any weaknesses." He winked, flashing a grin, and John did seem to relax due to the levity in his tone—and perhaps he understood that what Sherlock meant was, _'Not that you're a weakness; no, I like you.'_

"Well, alright then," John replied, leaning back into his chair and smiling, fiddling with the Union Jack pillow with his good hand.

Sherlock settled onto the end of the sofa closest to John's chair and flipped on the telly. As they watched an afternoon rerun of an endearingly cheesy science-fiction program about aliens and time-travel, Sherlock was once again struck by the overwhelming, disconcerting relief wafting through him. But this time he decided it wasn't worth it to let it bother him. John was home.


	7. Valentine

**Title:** Just Another Cheesy Valentine's Fic  
**Pairing/Characters**: Sherlock/John  
**Rating**: PG to PG-13, maybe for language.  
**Word count:** Just over 3700.  
**Summary**: Sherlock has a case on Valentine's Day, John accompanies him, fluff ensues.  
**Warnings:** Un-Beta'd, Un-Britpicked, general spoilers for S1. See a mistake, point it out, and I may just give you a cyber-hug.  
**Disclaimer**: The only thing I can lay claim to is the order of the words.

* * *

It was strange, actually, the way he kept getting distracted by the St. Valentine's decorations in the shop. Technically speaking, he didn't _have _a Valentine this year—a common enough state of affairs if not an all-out voluntary one—so there was no reason that any of the candy hearts or pink balloons should have caught his eye whatsoever. And yet…the teddy-bear holding the cracked-up plush heart that read _'You Complete Me' _was _tempting _for reasons that were not eager to jump to mind.

He stared at the bear for only a few seconds, not eager to get caught pondering a Valentine's gift at Tesco's. He'd only come out to the shop for orange juice, per Sherlock's request—for an experiment, not due to any new concern for their Vitamin C intake—and coming home with a superfluous and recipient-less Valentine's bear would probably raise a very particular eyebrow.

And, actually, it was the thought of raising that eyebrow that caused John to toss the toy into his basket. If he couldn't have a Valentine this year, then at least perhaps he could have some fun and try to confuse Sherlock, who was perhaps the second-most aware-of-John's-Valentine-less-ness person in the word.

As it was, if Sherlock was confused by the bear's presence in the shopping back which John presented to him, he was too proud to show it. He got it out of his way with a casual flick of his wrist, pulling out the carton of juice with a self-satisfied smile before walking away.

'_He's going to soak some poor sod's fingers in it,' _John moaned to himself, righting the toppled bear on the kitchen table. _'Perhaps you're lucky he didn't seem to take much interest in you. You'll live longer that way, one thinks.'_

The bear had nothing to say on the subject, except of course: "You Complete Me."

* * *

The next day was the day before the day before St. Valentine's Day, and the first day of John's weekend shift down at the surgery. He left Sherlock at the table with his experiments—he wasworking with teeth, turns out—and the little bear was left sitting right at the detective's elbow. John wasn't sure how aware Sherlock was of the toy's presence—hard-drive and all that, after all. He opted not to mention it.

Work the next two days brought in a string of chronically and unfailingly unhappy patients, among whose number could be counted a toddler with a bean up his nose, no less than ten sore throats, two twisted ankles, thirteen fevers, and a teenage girl with a bizarre case of chickenpox. Not exactly the most exciting regimen, although the chickenpox girl raised an eyebrow or two for a minute. On the whole, though, he could hardly keep his mind from wandering back to Baker Street, and once his _body _was able to wander back there, all he really wanted to do was collapse onto the sofa and sleep until noon the next day.

Unfortunately, although not surprisingly, Sherlock had already taken the hoped-for spot, so John decided to settle for his usual chair, stretching out his legs as best he could. A few idle minutes passed, in which John aimlessly pondered the idea that starting a fire would be lovely in this weather, before Sherlock broke into his thoughts with a pickax.

"Do you want to go out to dinner with me tomorrow night?" He asked it with such nonchalance that it was almost comical that John started, although that never stopped him before and probably never would.

"Are you feeling eager to have a big red letter 'A' pinned to your lapel, then?" John asked, attempting to hide his shock with humour. _'Oh Hell,' _he thought, _'there's the bloody bear!' _And lo, the damn thing was sitting on the floor in front of the sofa, happy as a daisy. _'Well done, Dr. Watson. You've sent another inadvertent message that you weren't sure you were ready to send. _Really _well done.'_

"I assume you're making a pop-culture reference," Sherlock droned with that blank tone of voice that said that he'd already deemed this conversation beneath his dignity.

John knitted his brow. "Well, it's from a book from the nineteenth century, so I'm not sure if pop-culture is really the correct term. At this point I worry it may just be _culture._"

Sherlock hummed in arrant disinterest.

"Oh come on, Sherlock! _The Scarlet Letter! _It's a classic! Granted, it's an American classic, but still—"

"I am supremely sorry to have derailed your joke in this manner," Sherlock interrupted with a wry smile and a twinkle in his eyes. Unbidden, John wondered how bored Sherlock had been before John came home to entertain him. Was he usually this indulgent of John's floundering?

"Right. Well. It's a book about a girl being punished for adultery, and the point was, wouldn't it be cheating on your _work _to take a bloke out to dinner on St. Valentine's Day? People already think we're an item, and _you're _a married man."

Sherlock looked…_amused _at John's line of thinking. John imagined that such ribbing from anyone else should have raised Sherlock's hackles, but the detective always seemed to save certain reactions special for John. John decided against considering the implications of that.

Instead he laughed and asked, "What is it?"

Sherlock sat up in one lithe, feline motion, smiling dryly all the way. "Oh, nothing. I'm just finding myself quite fond of your ability to misconstrue every little thing I say. One would think you enjoy getting the wrong idea."

John flushed at the prodding, but rather than giving in to it, he crossed his arms and chuckled. "Oh, is that what you think?"

"It's one of several theories."

John was slowly registering the strange warmness in Sherlock's eyes. He had to keep this banter going before he could allow himself to be lost in those eyes. It happened sometimes, often in the most inconvenient of moments, much to his chagrin.

"Oh yeah? And are those theories any good?"

"Well, they'd _have _to be good, or else they wouldn't be mine, would they?" He chuckled once, and then tilted his head towards John's laptop, where an email was sitting open on the screen. "The dinner is for a case. I need to do a bit of spying, and I'd stick out like a sore thumb if I went alone to a high cuisine restaurant on _Valentine's Day._"

John smirked. "At least you understand _that _much about modern society."

Sherlock was in such an uncommonly good mood—he flashed another keen smile. "So you'll come? I trust you don't have any"—and here one supposedly errant foot kicked the bear from its spot—"other plans?"

"Not a one." He regarded the once-more-toppled bear with pursed lips. "So that's it, then? Should I bring flowers, or do you not believe in method-acting?"

Sherlock didn't reply immediately, but his bright grey eyes slipped to the bear on the floor—a veritable elephant in the room, for some reason. It stared up at the two men with its cheap, beaded eyes and sewn-on eyelashes, laughing at them both, it seemed.

"Or I suppose I could just bring _that,_" John finally continued, his words falling somewhat flat. "Put some use to it."

"Indeed." Sherlock kicked it towards John, who scooped it up with inexplicable hesitance.

'_Somehow I don't think this is what Mum was warning me and Harry about when she told us to avoid making impulse purchases,' _John thought as he looked at the apparently treacherous bear. _'You were supposed to be a joke, you tricksy little bugger.'_

The bear had nothing constructive to say, so John set it aside in favour of the show Sherlock had flicked on.

* * *

The first time John had seen Sherlock shed his own personality for another, he'd been pretty impressed, if a little unnerved. Because really, if he thought about it, it was terrifying to think that a great mind like Sherlock's could hide behind a casual smile and a colloquial twang. That was how Jim Moriarty had gotten to them, after all. Sherlock's self-proclaimed sociopathic behavior and countenance acted as a warning to the rest of their species, a signal to be cautious. It was vaguely unsettling when Sherlock turned his signals off in order to get what he wanted from strangers, whether it was pretending to be a forgetful ditz to get into a dead man's apartment, or a privileged, fussy boyfriend in order to get a table as close to his suspect as possible.

Which was exactly what he was doing now. He had a casual arm slung around John's shoulders, making demands of the hostess with such a nonthreatening drawl that he sounded more entitled than demanding. In the end he got the seat he wanted—a half-booth that faced the rest of the restaurant, and gave a clear view of their unsuspecting suspect, two tables ahead of them.

Sherlock, devoted to the part he was playing, made sure to sit as close as possible to John, keeping his arm draped around his friend's shoulders. John should have been embarrassed or flustered, but after the first few minutes or so he decided it wasn't worth the trouble; it was nice, after all, to feel like somebody's boyfriend for a while. For a man who seemed unremittingly single, he liked being in a relationship.

He set his forehead on Sherlock's shoulder. "So that's him?" he asked. "The man in the tweed coat sitting with the blonde?"

Sherlock pulled John in a little closer for a moment. "Brunette, actually."

John shifted his head a little to look at their targets; the woman's eyebrows _were _quite a few shades darker than they could possibly have naturally been. Sherlock's hair brushed his cheek as he moved. "So…yes?"

"Yes." Sherlock shifted again, holding open the menu so they could both see. "Have you decided what you're going to have yet? We haven't got forever."

"I think I have, don't worry. I take it you won't be having anything?"

Sherlock's smirk was practically audible. "No, I will. We're undercover, remember?"

John laughed. "Of course, of course." He picked up his head—Sherlock did not remove his arm—and reached around to place the gift-bag he'd been holding onto the table. "I've got our alibi right here."

Sherlock's gently sardonic smile was one to rival John's own as he relinquished John's shoulders to reach for the bag. "You shouldn't have," he murmured, sounding strangely smug as he pulled out the little bastard of a bear. He grinned like a besotted schoolboy at the gift, but his sharp eyes flashed up to look out across the restaurant. John glanced in the direction of his friend's gaze, careful not to stare, and saw that their mark was watching them with recognition in his eyes. He must have seen Sherlock's face on the news after the Pool Incident. John _knew _it was a bad idea to advertise Sherlock's existence more than the two of them already did on their websites.

"Ohhhh yes," Sherlock murmured, "he's been warned about me." He turned a surprisingly tender smile to John, his eyes glittering like he could hardly wait to tell a joke he'd thought up. "We should try to throw him off the scent."

"What do you mean?" The words sounded heavy, clumsy as they fell from his mouth. He didn't know what to do about that.

Sherlock rolled his eyes, but he didn't seem to mean anything malicious by it. "Let's show him that we really are only here for a Valentine's dinner."

And before John could think to ask what Sherlock meant by that, they were kissing.

And John…wasn't sure how to feel about it. He had enough presence of mind to be able to admit to himself that they'd been dancing around their feelings for a while now, and in a way he was _happy _to be kissing Sherlock. But he also realized that, to Sherlock, this was simply the most logical course of action to keep their cover intact. This was for the case and likely nothing more.

Meanwhile, Sherlock's lips were warm and gently insistent against John's, and a cool hand moved to cup his cheek. Eyes closed, John wasn't sure whether or not Sherlock was still flashing looks at their suspect to see if his makeshift plan had worked. He probably was. John wasn't sure he cared what Sherlock was doing, actually, at least as far as the man's eyes went.

Finally, after what could only have been a few seconds or so, Sherlock pulled away, looking into John's eyes with a stricken expression, as though he'd just now realized something that he felt should have occurred to him earlier. Then his brow furrowed, and his eyes slipped back to their mark. John looked as well, and lo, they were once more unobserved.

John's eyes moved back to Sherlock's face at the same time that Sherlock's gaze returned to his. John moved a few inches back, laughing a bit uncomfortably. "You stole that idea from _Inception_," he accused, turning away to fiddle with the menu.

"Pardon?" Sherlock sounded distracted, as though he'd been pulled from a thought—although when was Sherlock _not _in the middle of a thought? "What are you talking about?"

"Oh, come on!" John was pleased by the nonchalance in his tone, the easy, unaffected camaraderie. "We watched that film _together _just a few months ago!"

Sherlock said nothing, the silence bemused.

"Right," said John. "You've deleted it. Right." He was suddenly and inexplicably irritated, although he knew that he had no rational reason or right to be. But frankly he didn't feel he had any use for rationality in this case. Finally, he said very quietly, "You know, I think I'd prefer it if you didn't delete anything that had to with me." He wanted to be more demanding about it, to be insistent and firm, but then it'd almost have to be an ultimatum, and he wasn't exactly sure enough of himself to offer an ultimatum to Sherlock Holmes. And not because Sherlock was a manipulative genius—no, he was just _Sherlock_, and John didn't want any kind of rift to develop between them. So he left the _'if I'm going to stick around' _unsaid, knowing Sherlock would understand.

Sherlock continued to say nothing, but the silence didn't feel hostile or protesting. Besides, it was broken soon enough when the waitress finally came to take their order. After that, the dinner—because could it really be called a date if it was for a case?—was spent surreptitiously observing their mark. Sherlock had reason to believe that the roundish, red-faced man was out to make some sort of transaction with his date tonight, a transaction that would lead him—and his tails—to heaps of…weapons? Drugs? Money? Sherlock hadn't been clear about _what _exactly the man was after, only that if they could prove that he was getting _something _illegally, it could back up an otherwise prison-bound man's story. And that kind of thing seemed important to Sherlock—that is, ensuring that no person was condemned to a fate which they did not deserve, even if doing so condemned them _to _a deserved fate, as with Angelo. This quirk helped endear Sherlock to John, helped paint him as the somewhat noble hero Sherlock insisted he wasn't.

After a while, Sherlock started taking pictures with his phone of their mark—Daniel Jameson, John suddenly remembered. But he also made sure to take date-like photos, as if he was still worried that Jameson would look over again. He took photos of the bear, of their meals, of the lovely restaurant, and _numerous _of John, who got smiley and red at the attention. Sherlock seemed somewhat giddy too, had seemed so since yesterday. John had to wonder how much of his current mood was just precautionary.

Finally, Jameson and his date seemed to finish their meal—Sherlock's camera-phone flew back to take pictures of them. The woman reached into her purse and pulled out an envelope. Jameson, obviously too impatient for his own good, tore it open as soon as he touched it, and the woman sat across from him looking annoyed. Sherlock continued snapping pictures as the man leant forward to kiss the woman on the cheek and left the restaurant in a hurry.

Sherlock and John followed no more than forty-five seconds later, John slapping money on the table as the chase officially began.

* * *

It was drugs. Mounds upon mounds of drugs in a locked garage. Jameson had gone there immediately, so impatient that it would probably cost him his freedom, leading Sherlock and his camera directly to corroboration of his client's story. Sherlock took dozens of photos from where he and John hid on the roof of an adjacent building, and made short work of emailing the most important ones to Lestrade, in whose hands lay their client's liberty.

Once again, they left the scene shortly after Jameson did, their work complete. They were looking for a cab when John finally realized: "Oh hey, we left the bear at the restaurant."

It took Sherlock half a second to remember what John was on about, but then he looked amused. "You have such a talent for forgetting things once we start our chases. Do you want to go back for it?"

John shrugged, idly taking note of how close Sherlock was standing—quite possibly to ward off the not insignificant cold. "Hey, don't get on me about that. It's _your _bear, not mine. You decide."

As it sometimes did, Sherlock's mind got snagged on a single detail: "_My _bear? _You _bought it."

"And then I gave it to _you."_

Sherlock blinked. "Did you _buy _it for me?"

John laughed, suddenly amused by how little Sherlock was _getting it. _"I certainly didn't buy it with anyone else in mind. It was _meant _for you. I wanted to see how you'd react."

Sherlock's expression was suddenly urgent, almost frustrated. He ought to have been hissing _'Sister!' _"I was sure you'd bought it for someone else."

John looked down at his feet, raising his eyebrows as though there was something immensely interesting down there. "Yes, well, there really isn't anyone else. Hasn't been since Sarah, honestly, if Sarah ever really counted."

He looked back up in time to see Sherlock nod decisively, his eyes adamant and sure. "We should go back for it."

Suddenly, John was scared out of his wits. He hadn't really expected Sherlock to take him seriously. His more cowardly instincts told him to backtrack _fast._ "Look, Sherlock, I didn't mean to guilt you into anything. We don't need—"

And then Sherlock's hand alighted on the side of John's neck. His long fingers brushed his nape, his thumb sliding nimbly across John's jaw. "John," he said, although it was really more of a breath. "It's fine. You got me a _Valentine's gift_ and, selfish prick that I am, I want it." Then both his hands disappeared into the pockets of his coat. "You know how I never really bother to object when people mistake you for my date?"

"I _had _noticed that, actually. I thought it was just because you didn't care what people thought." He sounded abashed, defeated almost, but he smiled.

Sherlock flashed a closed-lipped smile as well, very warm for a moment. Then, as businesslike as if he was negotiating with an unstable criminal, he said, "My point is, no one would think any less of you if you wanted to let them be right for at least a night."

And it nearly knocked John over; it wasn't a confession of love, not quite, but in Sherlock's own way, he was admitting to John _and _to himself that he _wanted _something, something he didn't quite know how to ask for outright. It probably unnerved him to really _want _something; normally when he asked something of anybody, even John, it was because he needed it for his work. His work was everything. He was _married _to his work.

And suddenly, in that context, John realized that he was really quite jealous of Sherlock's work.

If he hadn't come to these conclusions, he might have still been hesitant. But now he felt…empowered. As though he had been given some sort of permission, some sort of right. And he wanted to take advantage of it, wanted to like he never thought he would have.

It was easy to pull Sherlock's willing face to his own, his hands bunched in the taller man's lapels. Sherlock was pliant in John's hands, wanting to learn as much as he could as quickly as he could. He'd seemed sure of himself back at the restaurant, but now that he was doing this for _himself_, not for his work, his inexperience was obvious. John smiled into the kiss, wanting to both calm and reassure his friend. Sherlock seemed to appreciate the gesture, wrapping his long arms around John's middle. Oh yes, this was right, this was good. John's arms slipped around Sherlock's neck as his tongue brushed his friend's lower lip, inviting and asking permission at the same time.

And Sherlock, against all his better judgments and prouder instincts, _moaned._

* * *

It took a few minutes longer than it might have otherwise, but they _did _get back to the restaurant, and they _did _get the bear back from the irritated hostess. When they got back to the flat, Sherlock put the bear on the shelf beside the skull, which had been liberated from Mrs. Hudson's keeping several weeks ago.

John was again struck by how easy things remained between them. When he'd allowed himself to think about it, he'd worried that any attempt to make a shift in their relationship would instead make a rift, would cause some sort of disaster—but nothing had seemed to change. It was as if the Universe had decided that it didn't mind if they tried to be happy.

Because they _did _both seem happy, unlikely as it seems, when Sherlock gave him a self-deprecating smile, said "Happy Valentine's Day," and moved to kiss John again.


	8. Bed

**Title**: First is the Worst, Second is the Best  
**Pairing/Characters**: Sherlock/John  
**Rating**: PG to PG-13, maybe for language.  
**Word count:** Just at 1500  
**Summary-type-thing**: Sleeping together and _sleeping together _are not the same thing at all.  
**Warnings:** Un-Beta'd, Un-Britpicked. See a mistake, point it out, and I may just give you a cyber-hug. :3  
**Disclaimer**: The only thing I can lay claim to is the order of the words.

**~Truth in Canon: **

_It was late that night when Holmes returned from his solitary excursion. We slept in a double-bedded room, which was the best that the little country inn could do for us. I was already asleep when I was partly awakened by his entrance._

_"Well Holmes," I murmured, "Have you found anything out?"_

_He stood beside me in silence, his candle in his hand. Then the tall, lean figure inclined towards me. "I say, Watson," he whispered, "Would you be afraid to sleep in the same room with a lunatic, a man with softening of the brain, an idiot whose mind has lost its grip?"_

_"Not in the least," I answered in astonishment._

_"Ah, that's lucky," he said, and not another word would he utter that night._

_-_ "The Valley of Fear"

* * *

The first time John woke up in bed with Sherlock, they were in a tiny inn _somewhere _in the countryside.

A bizarre string of post-Christmas robberies had had them jumping around the country for three days at this point, and John had begun to lose track of exactly _where _they were. Sherlock, of course, with his GoogleMaps-esque knowledge of the whole bloody country, felt none of John's geographical uncertainty and was in fact rather irritated by it. He didn't complain, though, because while John lacked a supercomputer's memory for the entirety of Britain, he _did _have quite a good memory for names and faces and personalities. John felt doctors _needed _to have that sort of memory if they wanted any sort of successful practice; patients, especially in the army, appreciated feeling as though their doctors remembered and cared about them. He found the same went for his and Sherlock's clients.

So Sherlock and John would throw evidence and clues around in order to wrap their minds around them, John using the names of the people they'd met, Sherlock using the names of the places they'd visited, the names all weaving together in collusion. In this manner they painted a very comprehensive picture of the situation at hand, and Sherlock was saying that they would probably be able to go home in the next few days as they opened the door to their tiny hotel room on the third night of the case.

And what they found waiting for them was one double-bed smack-dab in the middle of the far wall. The unassuming piece of furniture, John imagined in his mildly-sleepless state, somehow managed to look smug despite its inanimateness.

"Oh. So…so _this _is why the lady at the front gave us a strange look when we said we wanted a 'double-bedded room'," said John, the tired words as graceful as a newborn foal.

"Divorcee, failed actress, mother of two boys," Sherlock intoned, hiding his irritation with effectively useless observations. "The eldest has just now reached his teenage years and the youngest is perhaps ten."

"Probably thought she was having a well-needed laugh," John replied without much emotion as he stepped sluggishly into the little room to set down his luggage. Under normal circumstances he would have perhaps considered going down and giving the woman an earful, but it was well past midnight and his bones were _aching _from the cold and his need for sleep—he was going to get under those covers and go _comatose_, whether he had a bloody bedmate or not.

Sherlock, past his initial irritation with the entire human race in general, now looked rather unperturbed, moving silently to the bathroom to change into his grey pyjamas, coming back after John had stripped down to a white T-shirt and boxers. John was climbing into the bed when Sherlock came back, not even looking in the other man's direction, and Sherlock took this as emphatic instructions to _not _try to start a conversation. This was easy enough. He turned off the antique-looking lamps that were scattered about the small room and crawled soundlessly under the covers, keeping as much room as Earthly possible between the backs they turned to each other.

Sherlock was actually a very polite bedmate, John would muse later. He seemed to sleep like the dead, never stirring except for the one time around 2:15 in the morning when John shot awake, shouting senseless words and grabbing his bad shoulder. Sherlock only touched John once, then, placing one long, spidery hand on John's chest, the other on his back, coaxing him back into a lying position, murmuring what could very nearly be called sweet nothings until John went still again. That was the only time Sherlock breached the midline of the bed, the rest of the time staying curled on his side, his long body bent in on itself in a loose and yet somehow sharp-cornered fetal position. _John _was the one who ended up being the rude bedmate, really. It was almost a little embarrassing.

At maybe six the next morning John woke up with his face very close to Sherlock's back, his hands very nearly touching the soft-looking fabric of the other man's shirt. Face reddening, John tumbled out of the bed and flew into the shower, as though he could wash out the sudden awkwardness that was making a nest in every one of his cells.

Sherlock, of course, was all business when John got back, claiming the shower as soon as his friend crossed the threshold between the two small rooms, and they never really had a reason or a chance to mention the less-than-ideal sleeping arrangements again; by nine o'clock they were on a train to _another _little village—some little place called Sand-something? Sandburg? Sandston?

"No," Sherlock said, outwardly patient but probably _actually_ seething with loathing towards the entire planet, "_Sanford. _Some idiots made off with a _swan_, there." And the man's disgust with every bumbling idiot in the world made John smile and think, _'Good God, what would I do if I was ever _really _in bed with this lunatic?'_

* * *

The second time John woke up in bed with Sherlock was the morning of February the 15th, and they were in Sherlock's room, bare, mussed, and entwined.

John's first thought was, _'Oh my God, we are the biggest Valentines cliché in the book.' _But then he realized that Sherlock's hair was in his face, so instead of complaining he pressed his nose into it and thought, _'But who gives a flying fuck?'_

Once again, Sherlock did not seem to have stirred throughout the entire night once he was asleep, lying limp as a fresh corpse with his body splayed out across the bed, half blanketing John's own body—in exactly the same position as he'd been in when John closed his eyes last night.

Wait.

John imagined that now would have been a good time for his heart to stutter—it _would _have stuttered if this were a scene in one of those cheesy romance novels that Harry used to keep stacked around her room, seemingly begging John to flip through a few—because he realized that _he too _was in the same position as he'd been in when he last closed his eyes. _He had stayed still all night. _This hardly ever—almost never—happened since John's return from Afghanistan. It was always tossing and turning and thrashing and shouting and all that nonsense with him. But…not last night?

If he'd ever given it any thought before this moment, he would have felt nervous at the thought of having someone lie on him all night like this, making any sort of escape all the more difficult if he suddenly found himself in a night-terror-induced panic. But it was almost as if—and maybe this was just another example of what Sherlock called 'overly romantic musings', but still—it was almost as if John had actually _felt safe _last night. And he couldn't remember the last time that's been the case. He couldn't stand the darkness, the stillness of the night, hated having his back to anything but a wall in the dark. But this time—fuck, he didn't even _dream _this time.

His right arm was caught under Sherlock's ribcage and tingled sharply when he tried to wiggle his fingers. It would smart something awful when Sherlock woke and allowed blood-flow to the area to be reinstated, so he did not move to wake his—flat-mate, colleague, friend, partner, what? _Sherlock. _He just lay still with his nose in the dark mess that made up Sherlock's head, taking long, content breaths that caused the hair to shift and tickle his face. He drifted in and out of consciousness for a couple of hours or so like this until Sherlock finally woke of his own volition, making a vaguely snide and yet still genuine comment to John that he appreciated the fact that John had not seen it fit to shag and run last night, even if up a flight of stairs was the only direction John could have run.

If Sherlock had been a real human being and did not feel the need to wrap barbed-wire around every emotional thing he said, what would have instead come out of his mouth would have been something to the effect of, _'Thanks for staying down here with me. You're a good pillow. I would have missed you. I like you too much.' _

John responded with a kiss, closed-mouthed and brief, but tender and firm enough to coax Sherlock into turning onto his back. John gave a small gasp as the blood went rushing to his right arm, but he hid the sound by latching onto Sherlock's collarbone, effectively ducking his head as he murmured something that for all intents and purposes meant, _'I wouldn't have gone anywhere else even if I'd been offered _an obscene_ amount of money. I like you too much, too.'_


	9. Bohemia

**Title**: Bohemia, Bohemia's a Fantasy in Your Head  
**Pairing/Characters**: Sherlock/John, Wilhelm Ormstein, Irene Adler.  
**Rating**: PG to PG-13, maybe for language and mentions of sex-tapes.  
**Word count:** Just under 5000.  
**Summary-type-thing**: A BBC update on "A Scandal in Bohemia". This may have been done before, but if it has I never read one, so enjoy.  
**Warnings:** Un-Beta'd, Un-Britpicked. See a mistake, point it out, and I may just give you a cyber-hug. :3  
**Disclaimer**: The only thing I can lay claim to is the order of the words.  
**Notes: **Actually, the notes'd be better at the end of the fic. See you there. ^^

* * *

It was mid-March when Sherlock and John were visited by Wilhelm Ormstein, a German-born, small-time theatre star otherwise known by his fans and playbills as the King of Bohemia. He had a proclivity towards grand one-man shows in which he would prance about the stage in extravagant nineteenth-century garb, usually singing the praises of—you guessed it—la vie Boheme. John had read a little about the man once upon a time when he'd been looking for date ideas with Sarah, so even before their laughably regal-looking visitor was able to introduce himself properly, John recognized him and nearly laughed aloud. The King's street-clothes, it appeared, did not differ too greatly from the costumes he wore for his plays, despite the fact that his manner seemed to suggest that he'd wanted this appointment to be discreet. In fact, he seemed irritated when he realized that John recognized him; although, how he expected anyone _not _to remember his Wilde-esque choices in hair and clothing was beyond John.

After only a few moments of this tenseness, Sherlock grew frustrated with being left out of whatever it was that was causing John and Ormstein to flush—the latter with suppressed anger, the former with suppressed laughter—and demanded to be let in on their visitor's identity. John told him, ignoring the King's glare; he rushed past the explanation of exactly _why _he knew who the man was, feeling no desire to bring Sarah up at the moment.

Ormstein let out a blustery huff befitting of the century he seemed to idealize, but then he seemed to decide that John was _not _in the room turning to fully face the chair where Sherlock sat. He put on his best 'beseeching' expression, holding out his large hands, and said, "Mr. Holmes, I've seen your website and—and I know that sometimes you publish details of your cases."

Sherlock raised an eyebrow, realizing that Ormstein was ignorant of John's blog, but made no mention of it. "Only the most important and instructive ones," he clarified, sounding bored.

The King looked stung. "Well it's important to _me—_"

"I assumed as much." Sherlock smiled wryly. "Unfortunately that tells me very little. Why don't you sit down and give me _details_, your Majesty?" The title came out easily enough, but John could hear the quiet mockery in it. Shaking his head fondly, John took a seat in his own chair as Ormstein sat on the sofa, wringing his hands together. Despite his natural bravado, it was obvious that the King's nerves were severely frayed—and perhaps that was why Sherlock kept the mockery quiet.

"As your…friend apparently knows, Mr. Holmes," Wilhelm Ormstein began, sparing a glance towards John, "I am an actor—by no means famous, but I _do _have a precious following, one which I would like very much to hold onto."

Sherlock nodded, closing his eyes and pressing his palms together as he leaned back in his chair. John could read the tell-tale lines of impatience around his friend's mouth.

"Likewise," the King continued, "I've got a fiancée that I worry I could easily lose if—if my blackmailer is successful in her schemes."

Sherlock's eyes flew open then, his shoulders locked and stiff in his eagerness and impatience to hear more. Something John would come to learn about his friend was that the man had simply _no _patience or sympathy for blackmailers—in fact, it could be said that Sherlock hated blackmail more than any other crime in the world. John still wasn't sure why.

"You say 'her schemes'. You know exactly who your blackmailer is? You've had direct contact with her?"

Ormstein narrowed his eyes, obviously unnerved by Sherlock's sudden enthusiasm. "Yes, I know her quite well! She is my ex—" He broke off then, throwing his eyes to the floor for a moment. John wondered if he'd been about to say 'ex-girlfriend' or 'ex-lover'. Finally the King continued, "Several years ago we were engaged to be married."

Sherlock looked bored again, and John suddenly realized that his friend had his phone out, thumb poised over the keyboard. "A _name, _please, Mr. Ormstein."

The King went red again. "Irene Adler," he finally confessed. "She's—"

"An opera singer from New Jersey. Dual citizen. _Fascinating," _said Sherlock in his best 'this-is-so-not-fascinating' voice. The King didn't seem to catch the tone, because he just nodded along with Sherlock's words. "Now, would you please tell me what she has over you?"

The King's blush deepened further. It was a wonder any of the rest of his bulky body was receiving any blood at all. "Videos, Mr. Holmes. Really—really _nasty _videos." For a moment he dropped his royal persona, leaning towards Sherlock with a desperate, ashamed expression. "I was just a stupid kid back then, and I really loved her. I would've done anything if it meant she could have a good time."

"So you made a few sex tapes with her and now that you're engaged to another woman, Ms. Adler is threatening to release the tapes in what you perceive to be jealous rage," Sherlock finished, leaning back again.

"Yes, well—"The King stared at his powerful-looking hands for another few moments. "I've had a few…hackers attempt to destroy the video files from the outside, but her security is…quite strong. I—I really don't know what to do anymore. All I know is that I don't think I could stand it if my fiancée found out about my past…indiscretions."

Sherlock stared into space for a good portion of a minute, his folded hands in front of his pursed lips. Then he waved a hand in John's direction. "Give your contact information to my friend, Mr. Ormstein," he said languidly. "I'll take your case."

The King's face suddenly went slack and peaceful, and the tension in his shoulders and spine quickly fled. His back hit the back cushion of the sofa for the first time since sitting down. "Thank you, Mr. Holmes, thank you." Sherlock nodded, standing suddenly and sweeping off to his room, leaving John to get any last-minute details from the King of Bohemia.

* * *

Sherlock didn't leave to start his investigations until the next morning, leaving while John was still asleep. He didn't come back until an hour or so after John had finished his shift at the surgery—around eight, maybe.

John almost didn't recognize Sherlock when he came in. Sherlock has his thick hair straightened and gelled backwards from his face, plastered to his scalp, and he was clad in tight, low-cut jeans and an uncharacteristically stylish v-neck, three-quarter-sleeve jumper that didn't quite reach the top hem of his jeans. A thin strip of pale skin caught John's eye from between the two hems, but not before he saw _Sherlock's _eyes, which were artificially brown—alien, almost. Strange.

From a purely aesthetic point of view, he looked good—but not comfortable and not like himself and _not happy. _In fact, his dark expression said very eloquently, _'Curses, foiled again.' _John set down his half-eaten dinner and went to where his friend stood, seething, in the doorway, putting a hand lightly on Sherlock's wrist.

"Bad day at work?" he asked, smiling gently with a cocked eyebrow.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "Ineffective day," he muttered, which was a yes. "I did _meet _Ms. Adler, but she's a closed-off woman, very conscious of what she says around strangers, even when she's had a few pints in her. This is going to take longer than I thought." He twisted his semi-captured hand then, catching John's wrist in a Roman handshake. "I very nearly nicked her phone just to get her address. Ormstein forgot to give it to us. One of the only helpful things I learned was that she most definitely keeps the video files on a single separate memory-stick, not her PC." He looked down at their hands as he spoke, thinking hard. He didn't elaborate.

John meanwhile was staring at Sherlock's lowered head. He reached up and pressed his fingers to the stiff hair, nearly a solid entity for all the product in it. "D'you think you're going out again tonight?" he asked quietly as Sherlock thought away.

"No, not tonight. Tomorrow morning she and I are going to coffee. And eventually I'm going to break into her flat and steal the flash-drive. But not tonight."

"Is that so?" John mumbled incredulously as he began to work his fingers through Sherlock's hard hair, breaking apart the stiff strands. The hair stuck up where John left it, and honestly it looked more than a little ridiculous. He laughed and took his other hand back so he could run both hands through his friend's hair. Sherlock was going to have a hell of a time washing all this product out, he thought.

"_Well,_" Sherlock said with a wry smile and a tilt of his head, "_technically _she's going to _let _me into her flat and _technically _she's going to _show _me where the flash-drive is, but for all intents and purposes I'll be robbing her." He made a small, content sound as John continued his mission to muss his hair, momentarily distracted.

"And why do you figure she's going to do that?" John murmured, but he neither expected nor received an answer. Sherlock liked to keep his grand coup de grâce a secret until the eleventh hour, and John was past trying to change that.

So instead of pressing the question he just kissed the exposed skin of Sherlock's collarbone before giving Sherlock's hair up as a bad job and offering his friend dinner. Sherlock said "Yes, please," and promptly stole half of John's sandwich, grinning with his hair sticking out on all ends.

* * *

The 'investigation' went on for a couple weeks, Sherlock leaving every few days in his hipster costumes to ingratiate himself with Irene Adler. After the first day he came home increasingly chipper and confident in the case, ever more sure that he would be able to get into Ms. Adler's home and nick the memory stick. Not only that, but he seemed to be enjoying his days out with the woman, blackmailer or not. She was intelligent and had a quick with, and she never seemed t allow pop-culture references to control her rhetoric, which was a relief for Sherlock. She liked to talk about music and art, subjects which Sherlock had a very good handle on, which made it easy to hold long conversations with her, thereby gaining her trust.

John would have been insanely jealous if it hadn't been for the fact that Sherlock would always sprawl out on the sofa with his head in John's lap after he came home, allowing his friends to work the stiffness out of his gelled hair as they talked about their days. Sherlock seemed surprisingly able to separate himself from the case when there was nothing he could do about it from home, so while it was obvious that Sherlock admired Irene Adler's intellect, it was still plainly apparent that Sherlock had no interest in her other than foiling her plans, unlike his hipster character. So John was able to keep his bull-pup in check.

* * *

Eventually the morning came when Sherlock woke John before leaving, handing him a scrap of paper with an address written on it in his sharp, intent handwriting.

"That's the address of her block of flats," Sherlock explained, brushing his gelled hair back as he spoke. "Be ready for a text from me at maybe eleven or twelve, but don't reply to it."

"Oh so I _do _get to take part in this adventure," John mumbled with mild, sleepy sarcasm.

Sherlock laughed at the word 'adventure' and leaned over to ruffle John's hair. "Don't sleep too late," he reminded his friend. "Our royal friend's reputation and relationship depend on it."

John swatted the hand away and Sherlock left the room, chuckling fondly.

* * *

It was 11:24 when John got the text, which read very simply:

**Wait ten minutes. Then find a secluded fire-alarm in the building and pull it. Then get the hell out. I'll meet you at Baker St.—SH**

John blinked at the text for a few moments before promptly deleting it. Couldn't have illegal instructions saved in his bloody inbox, could he? He looked at his watch and nodded to himself, quietly leaving the little store he'd been browsing to walk the few blocks down to the block.

* * *

Once, when he and Harry had been in primary school, John had watched his sister pull a fire-alarm just for the hell of it. He'd done his damnedest to convince her not to, but they'd been arguing earlier that morning and Harry was in _no _mood to have her fun ruined by _Johnny _of all people. However, once the shrill bell was ringing and threatening all four of their eardrums, Harry grabbed John's hand, giggling madly, and they both sprinted out of the school to join the crowds filing out of the building with solemn, disciplined practice. They never got caught by the school, and for the longest time that was the fondest memory John shared with Harry.

That memory was all John could seem to think of as he hoofed it out of the block of flats, trying his best to look like a distressed tenant, not wanting another court-date on Sherlock's account.

Once he got home to Baker Street, serious jitters ran through John's body, making it nearly impossible to lock the door behind him or to pour himself a steadying cup of tea; at one point he splashed himself with the boiling water, and while he reeled in pain he wondered how long it would take Sherlock to notice the burn-marks.

Sherlock came home half an hour after John, his face bright with the pride of victory and the thrill of thievery. As soon as he found John standing before the kitchen sink, he swept forward and caught John's face in his hands, kissing him soundly. John could feel a warmed stick of blunt plastic in Sherlock's hand, pressing into his cheek. He kissed back happily enough for several lovely moments, but soon he pulled away, grabbing the hand that held the flash-drive and taking it away from his friend.

"This is it, then?" he panted. "Seems like an easy enough operation."

"Quite," Sherlock agreed, grinning and running his hands up and down John's arms. "I'll tell you about it in a bit. Call Mr. Ormstein and we can have this whole thing done with."

"_You're _in a good mood," John noted, reaching up to restart the process of messing up Sherlock's hair. Before his hands could get there, though, Sherlock grabbed the burned one, gave John a sharp look, and kissed it before taking back the flash-drive.

"I just enjoy my work," Sherlock replied, smiling enigmatically. He stepped back a few paces. "Call Mr. Ormstein," he repeated, cocking his head to the side, and then he left to have a much-needed shower. As his friend walked away, John caught side of a dark mark behind Sherlock's ear; at first he thought it was a bruise, but only a moment later he realized it was a dark maroon lipstick stain. John fell very suddenly from his post -adventure high and turned his reddening face from his friend's retreating back.

Without much excitement, he called Wilhelm Ormstein.

* * *

The extravagant actor did not take long to reappear in the Baker Street sitting room, whereupon he insisted on pulling Sherlock into a tight hug as soon as the younger man showed him the flash-drive. Sherlock's jaw went visibly hard until he was released, and he was quick to hand over the stick, not wanting to give the King any further reasons for touching him.

"How did you get it?" the King asked, looking wonderingly at the little plastic tube in his hands.

The smile Sherlock gave should have been reserved for villains in bad serial-killer-films. He just looked so very _pleased _with his proficiency as a thief that John very quickly thanked God that Sherlock usually chose to use his powers for good.

"If you believed your home to be on fire, what would be the first _possession _of yours that you would attempt to rescue?" he asked, leaning against the wall, languid and comfortable.

Ormstein hesitated, perhaps using the pause to gauge Sherlock's possible reaction. Then he shrugged and said slowly, "My collection of antique scripts, I guess...They're insured. So...yes. Those."

"Because they're irreplaceable," Sherlock agreed, nodding as though he'd been expecting this sort of answer. "Because they have intense personal and financial value."

Ormstein's hand closed more tightly around the memory stick. "Yes...so...?"

Sherlock's teeth were briefly exposed as he smiled. "When my friend here set off the fire-alarm in Ms. Adler's building, the first thing Ms. Adler did was run to a very specific drawer to save that little memory stick. She stuck it right in her coat pocket before collecting any other items. It was simple enough to nick the stick as I helped her to evacuate."

Sherlock really had some of the best laugh-lines, John thought, and he was showing them off quite enthusiastically right now. John might have kissed them if he and his friend hadn't been busy with company.

Somehow Ormstein didn't look reassured by Sherlock's explanation; rather he glanced once again at the hand that held the flash-drive with a nervous grimace and asked, "Do you...do you think I could maybe...check to make sure that what we think is on this..._is _on this?" His face was red and obviously mortified, but he went on, angrier at his own embarrassment than anything else. "Maybe records of her bills are on here, or photographs, or—" He cut himself off. "I only need a moment with one of your computers. I _am _sorry, but—"

Sherlock held up an impatient hand, irritated that Ormstein was skeptical of his wonderfully executed plan. "I agree, of course. I'd be loath to take money for stealing a woman's prized possession before making sure that it is the _correct _possession." He smiled the smile he gave when what he really wanted to tack on to the end was, _'But of course that isn't going to happen, you quaint little non-believer.' _He gestured towards the only laptop in the room—not John's, by some miracle—in a 'have-at-it' sort of movement.

Sherlock moved to sit smugly in his armchair as Ormstein plugged the memory stick into the computer. He propped his legs up over the one arm of the chair, looking like a child waiting for his father's praise of good marks in school. Needless to say, when Wilhelm Ormstein gasped and stared horror-struck at the computer screen, Sherlock looked more than a little perturbed.

"What is it?" he hissed, storming to the sofa where the King sat. Without so much as a pause for politeness, Sherlock snatched the laptop away and sat of the floor between the sofa and the coffee table, placing the computer on the scratched-up wood. John took this as a sign to scramble onto the sofa behind Sherlock so he could lean in and see the screen as well.

The desktop was empty, save the one window that was open, and that window was empty save the one file that read: **"to_sherlock_holmes. avi"**_**. **_Sherlock was rigid on the floor and did not even seem to register it when John touched his shoulder. He only bobbed his head a little when John asked if he was going to open the file. After the half-nod, Sherlock seemed to regain only the slightest bit of motor skills, only moving enough to double-click the surprising file.

The first thing to appear in the newly-opened window was a small, pointed chin and a pair of full, dark red lips close to the camera, as if Irene Adler had been fiddling with her webcam when it came on. After a few seconds she sat back in her chair and smiled demurely at the camera. John blinked a couple times. He was in a happy relationship with an amazing and beautiful man, yes, but if John was bisexual, he was bi-leaning-straight, and he couldn't _help _but appreciate a beautiful woman when he saw one. From what he could tell from her face and torso, Irene Adler was petite and slender, pale only because she didn't like sunbathing. She had vaguely almond-shaped eyes that went back and forth throughout the video between green and blue, and she had long, coppery ringlets of somewhat frizzy hair that she kept stacked at the back of her head and allowed to twist forward to hang over one shoulder.

But most of all she looked confident and proud, stunningly smug in a way John had thought only Sherlock could pull off.

And then she began to speak, filling the room with her snarky New Jersey accent, causing all three men to flinch in embarrassment.

"Jesus Christ, Sherlock! I can't believe you actually _robbed _me!" she scolded, and then she paused. "Or do you mind if I call you Sherlock? I know you'd like me to believe your name is Simon Frost, but...seriously, hun? Sherlock Holmes is such a _badass _British name. I mean, I wish your name showed up in Baby Name books just so I could know _what _possessed your mom and dad to call you that. Seriously."

She paused again, her dark red lips momentarily separating to reveal her perfect American teeth. "But I'm rambling. Hun, I'm sorry. I'm you worked really hard on your disguise, but...well, a friend showed me your website once, and...well, all I'm saying is, if you don't want the bad guys to recognize your pretty little cheekbones, you should probably wear better disguises or take your picture off of your website. Or both." She shrugged nonchalantly, and John could feel Sherlock's shoulders go even stiffer under his hand, which John hadn't thought to be possible.

Irene Adler took a long breath and let it whistle back out through her teeth. "So...I don't know if Wilhelm is there, but if he isn't, could you pause me and go get him? I have a few things I need to him to hear from my own mouth." Her pretty little eyebrows knit together for a moment, almost pleading. By then Ormstein had scooted much closer, his knee pressing against Sherlock's shoulder.

At length the woman spoke again, the smugness gone and replaced by pained sincerity. "Willy, I'm so sorry if I've caused you stress or—or pain. You know me, though. You know how selfish and—and _petty _I can be. And jealous and bitchy and horrible. And I'm _sorry." _She closed her eyes for a few seconds, sighing. "I've deleted all the videos we made. They're all completely gone—no copies anywhere. I've been holding our relationship over your head for too long, and I've gone too far this time. It's time I...left you alone. Congratulations on your engagement, Willy." A small smile flitted over her features, and Wilhelm Ormstein gave a little sigh, sounding shocked and relieved at the same time.

"And Willy? Pay Sherlock the money you promised him. I didn't delete the files until after I realized you'd sent a private detective after me. He did his job as far as I'm concerned...Love you. Bye." And then she winked before leaning in close to the webcam again, whereupon the widow went black.

The only one of them that moved was Sherlock, who X-ed out of the window before the video could replay. After that they all sat quiet and still out of respect for the feelings of their companions.

John didn't move until a little more than half a minute had passed, leaning forward to pull the flash-drive out of the laptop. "Well then," he said quietly before clearing his throat. "Your reputation and engagement seem safe, Mr. Ormstein."

The King of Bohemia glanced from John to Sherlock to the laptop and back again. "Yes, quite. But how...how did she guess your plan to steal the memory-stick the way you did? How—"

Here Sherlock snapped, pushing the coffee table roughly away so he had room to stand. "She knew because she's bloody clever," he snarled. "You were _engaged _to her, for God's sake! You of all people should realize how clever she is! But why didn't _I? _What the _hell _did I miss, or let slip, or...?" His mouth clamped shut in indignation, his arms folded stiffly behind his rigid back. He glared at his feet and bit the inside of his cheek, staunchly attempting to be _only _angry and _not _embarrassed.

At length Ormstein stood, seemingly realizing how out of place he was and how badly Sherlock and John needed to be alone just then. He mumbled something like "I'll just go, then," and handed a check to John before sidling towards the door.

"Do you mind if I keep the memory stick, then?" Sherlock asked before the King could quite make it out of the flat.

Ormstein shrugged. "It's not mine. I heard what she wanted to say to me. If you think you want it, be my guest."

Sherlock flashed a brief, empty smile, and Ormstein left with a quiet _goodbye _and _thanks_.

When he was gone, John quickly went to Sherlock and wrapped his arms around the taller man's waist, not pausing to ask permission. He expected Sherlock to perhaps lash out with hurtful, embarrassed words, but that didn't happen. Instead Sherlock put his hands on the sides of John's neck and rested his forehead on the top of John's head.

"I can tell you're steeling yourself for an undeserved verbal beating," Sherlock murmured. "Your shoulders hunch inward and you duck your head close to your chest when you're bracing yourself for unpleasantness." He paused. "I regret the fact that I know that."

John shook his shoulders out and leaned in for kiss Sherlock's jaw. "I wouldn't worry about that if I were you. I've been bracing myself since I was a little boy whose friends liked to have pretend-swordfights with sticks, sans warning or code of chivalry."

Sherlock chuckled, but then sighed. "I _want _to be up against people with _brains_, John, but I _hate _to be outsmarted. Stupid as it is, I have my _pride—"_

"And that's what makes you human," John finished, growling against Sherlock's neck. "If you _weren't _bloody well pissed off right now, I'd be worried."

Sherlock—well, he _sort of _laughed, but it was sort of gaspy-sounding, also, so John wasn't sure of much other than the fact that the noise sent a warm burst of air into the shell of his ear. It wasn't unpleasant, either way.

"You say 'human' like it's a good thing," Sherlock laughingly retorted, the response without much bite.

John pulled slightly out of the embrace so he could look Sherlock in the eyes—grey-blue again, familiar and beautiful. "I like people. Call it a character flaw," he conceded, laughing. "You know, outsmarted or not, that was still a brilliant plan on your part. You just got unlucky."

Sherlock glanced away, shrugging. "We both ought to take our photographs off the Internet," he replied, smiling lightly, looking tired. Their hands brushed between them.

John stepped closer again and put a hand on the back of Sherlock's still-somewhat-damp hair, applying light pressure. Sherlock leaned in for a kiss, but John turned both their heads at the last second, twisting to kiss the skin behind Sherlock's ear. The skin was a little raw and hot from the scrubbing it had gotten in order to be rid of the lipstick stain.

Sherlock chuckled ruefully and laid his forehead gently on John's left shoulder, careful not to press down too hard. "I _thought _you'd noticed that," he half-whispered, sounding drained and apologetic.

John didn't address that directly, but rather replied, "You would have made a great criminal," making it sound like a sweet nothing. As he said it he could imagine those same words used as a jibe or an accusation, perhaps about the lipstick or any of the other questionable things Sherlock had done since they'd met. "Our friends at the Yard don't know how lucky they are." And that was like saying, _'I am so lucky to have you' _and _'I forgive you' _and _'For Christ's sake, cheer up, you're amazing' _all at once. And for his trouble he received an emphatic kiss that ended up on the sofa.

* * *

They didn't talk about it often, but John knew that there was a folder on Sherlock's computer for memorabilia of his personal favorite cases. He kept photographs of the Chinese code they'd discovered there, as well as a log of the texts and photos he'd gotten on the pink phone from Moriarty. And now Irene Adler's video sat in that folder, simple and unassuming with its original file name. Sherlock never seemed to watch it over again, but he _did _delete his picture from his website and suggested that John do the same. The next week Sherlock invested in a prosthetics kit and subsequently spent several hours practicing the art of transforming his face, chattering with John as he changed his nose or chin or applied fake sideburns and the like. Eventually he even managed to wrangle John into allowing his face to be rearranged, and that was how John knew he had absolutely no reason to be jealous or suspicious. Sherlock's fingers would too often brush the sides of John's face while he molded a new nose for him, and his hands would linger too long as he held the prosthetics to make the mold set. Irene Adler may have inspired this new project, but she really had nothing to do with it; her name was almost never mentioned, and the next week Sherlock and John got a new client, and life went on.

* * *

**Notes: **I know there are no pictures of Sherlock on the Science of Deduction website. And that totally works out for me, so yay. Also, this kinda ran away from me for a little bit but I think I may have gotten it back, maybe, sorta. So...I hope no one hates this~3


End file.
